


Ordinary Workplace Hazards, Or SHIELD and OSHA Aren't On Speaking Terms

by scifigrl47



Series: In Which Tony Stark Builds Himself Some Friends (But His Family Was Assigned by Nick Fury) [2]
Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Author has mental issues, Except for Phil and Clint they are full on slashing themselves at every chance, Humor, M/M, Pre-Slash, Tony should know better than to install AIs in things
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-23
Updated: 2012-05-02
Packaged: 2017-11-04 04:10:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 25,992
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/389598
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scifigrl47/pseuds/scifigrl47
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony Stark has once again engineered something that might well lead to the downfall of Western Civilization.  No one's really surprised.  This time, however, it might just be the lesser of two evils.</p>
<p>Clint and Phil hate playing pickup, but damn, Clint loves the Roombas, and damn, Phil loves Clint, though he's not really sure why sometimes.  It's time to play Hide-And-Seek with hostile robotic AIs in the SHIELD home office.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文 available: [正常的职业危害，又名，为什么神盾和职业安全与健康管理局老死不相往来](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1052215) by [shunziqing](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shunziqing/pseuds/shunziqing)
  * Translation into Italiano available: [Normali Rischi dell'ambiente di lavoro, ovvero , lo SHIELD e l'INAIL non si parlano](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2182719) by [EthicsGradient](https://archiveofourown.org/users/EthicsGradient/pseuds/EthicsGradient)



> Direct Sequel to "Some Things Shouldn't Be a Chore," so if you haven't read that one, you'll probably be confused. Of course, if you do read that one, you'll probably still be confused. There are semi-intelligent, self-replicating, flying Roombas. Yeah, you're confused already.
> 
> This was never supposed to happen. I had already started a few other stories in this 'verse, and was done with "Some Things Shouldn't Be a Chore," but I got a lot of kind feedback pointing out that SHIELD and Roombas was an opportunity that shouldn't be ignored. I am weak. What was supposed to be a short coda with Phil and Clint (who got ignored in the original story) has, as with everything I write, gotten out of control. Oops?
> 
> I have not seen The Avengers yet. My characterization of Hawkeye is based on my love of the character when I was a child. I had a crush on him at the age of eight, before I even understood what a crush was, and was sneaking my brother's comics from their mylar bags. Sorry if he doesn't fit movieverse, but I have high hopes that he's a smart mouthed ball of snark and attitude, because that is just fun to write.

“I swear to God, if you shoot even a single one of my babies, I will be seriously forced to reconsider loving you.”

“That's a shame. I'll miss the sex.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, who said anything about giving up the sex? That's not happening. No way. I'm just saying that instead of a stable, emotionally fulfilling long term relationship, we'll be forced to just have a lot of angry, angry sex and occasionally make out in supply closets.”

“I'm not seeing the downside here.”

“You'd miss waking up with me naked in your bed.”

“Possibly. I would not, however, miss the trail of discarded clothing that leads to you being naked in my bed. With you, there is always an unpleasant trade off of some sort. Also the snoring, I won't miss that in the least, if you want to know the truth.”

Clint Barton grinned, wide and bright and sharp. “Now, sir, I'm hurt. Deep down, in the cockles of my soul, I am weeping like a child.”

“Luckily, I never expected maturity when I started dating you, Barton,” Phil Coulson said, but his lips curled up, just the tiniest bit. For Coulson, it was the equivalent of a full body laugh, and Clint loved it.

As Clint watched, Coulson peered around the corner, his back up against the wall, his gun held with easy grace. Clint took a moment out of the Avengers' most recent crisis to appreciate that, because, damn, he loved it when Coulson was armed. The man could take out a spec ops operative with a goddamn Christmas wreath (Clint knew that to be a fact, he'd seen it), but arm the agent with an actual weapon and Clint had to seriously fight the urge to start taking his clothes off.

To this day, he was certain that the mission where Coulson ended up with both an RPG and an assault rifle had been a secret plot on Fury's part to kill him.

“I'm plenty mature,” he said, “I can buy my own booze and everything.”

“I cannot believe we let you have a gun.”

“Luckily for your peace of mind, I don't like using it,” Clint said, waiting for the signal that he knew was coming. He could read the lines of Coulson's body, the way his breathing shifted just in advance of his thoughts, the way his eyes went heavy lidded when he was ready. And that last one fit multiple uses of the word 'ready,' much to Clint's everlasting delight.

He was almost certain that Coulson had no idea that he got the same look in his eyes when approaching an op that he did approaching Clint with certain intentions, and Clint wasn't about to tell him. He did wonder if that meant the ops were as good as sex, or if the sex was just another op, carried out with just as much planning, precision and attention to detail.

Either way it ended with orgasms, lots and lots of orgasms, so Clint wasn't really interested in analyzing it too deeply.

Coulson didn't even look in Clint's direction, knowing that he'd be moving a step behind Phil, covering his back and watching for their target to double around and try to flank them. Their feet silent, they headed up the empty corridor, staying low and moving along the cover of the wall. When they came to a stop, Phil was at the corner, watching. “Here,” Phil said, shifting his weight and getting a better angle without exposing an inch of himself to the corridor beyond. It was a thing of beauty, really. “Intel indicates we have three minutes.”

“Not long enough for a quickie, then.”

“No.” Phil's eyes found Clint's, hot and sharp. “Not at work, Barton.”

“But you're always at work, and even when we're back at the tower, you're technically doing your job of babysitting Stark and keeping him from prank calling Doom or convincing Steve that Vegemite is a cookie frosting.”

“Are you asking me to chose between sex with you and the preservation of Western civilization, Barton?”

“I'm saying that I at least merit the consideration of a pity fuck in the supply closet, we have an entire ninety seconds left.”

“You want to get laid, perhaps you should work for it. You're an operative with a dozen years of experience in creative problem solving and goal oriented behavior, I think this is within your skill set.”

“You got that off of my annual report.”

“I wrote your annual report. It pretty much was, 'No major international incidents were conclusively linked to Agent Barton. That's a definite improvement over last year.'”

“I've got handcuffs and you get a little sluggish after about ten hours of paperwork,” Clint mused. “I might be able to pin you down then. Odds increase if I can switch your coffee out for decalf.”

Coulson's lips twitched. “Try again.”

“Listen, if you're going to shoot down my ideas without even giving them a proper chance, then I don't know if I can keep up this charade, sir.”

“Find a better idea and I'll humor you by considering it.”

“Well, I'm feeling under appreciated. You don't mind if I sleep around, do you?” The timer was running in his head, and he crouched down, bow at the ready, waiting, listening.

“Not at all. As long as you don't mind your partners disappearing in the middle of the night never to be seen again,” Phil said, smile stretching up just the tiniest bit. “Of course, it's up to you who lives and who dies.”

“Kinky,” Clint told him, approving. The muscles of his shoulders tensed, and his eyes flicked up. “Incoming,” he whispered, the breath of a word almost soundless.

Despite that, Coulson's chin dipped in a bare twitch of a nod. Keeping the gun at the ready, he held up a hand, flicking three fingers, then two, then one, and the two of them moved with one mind. 

Coulson stepped out in front of Clint, a fraction of a second before Clint released his arrow. It passed so close to Coulson's temple that it creased his hair, and he didn't so much as blink. Instead, he was already reaching up, his arm a blur of movement, his whole body a whiplash of controlled force. The arrow blew, releasing its net, the target sailed right in, and Coulson snagged it before the net even had time to bolo into place.

The target let out a wail and strained against the confines of the net, dragging Coulson down the hall almost two feet, his precisely polished shoes sliding along the carpet as he twisted, bracing his knees and slamming his weight against the forward momentum of the net. He only had to hold it for a minute before Clint was there on the other side, feet leaving the ground in a flicker of a jump. Clint sailed through the air, laughing as he went, and snagged the net with his free hand. 

Moving in perfect tandem, Clint and Phil swung their arms down and the net went crashing into the ground, its twisting, wailing contents swirling in circles, desperately trying to find a way out.

With the end of his bow, Clint pressed the off button on the top of the Roomba. It whirred to a stop, lights flickering off. “Sleeeeeeeep,” Clint sing-songed at it, grinning like a fool.

“I hate these things,” Coulson said, rolling back to his feet and jerking his jacket back into place. 

“Now, sir, that is just callous and unfeeling.” Clint went down on one knee to unwrap the Roomba from the net. “It wants only to make things tidy and clean. I would've thought this would be a notion you could get behind.”

“I lost any sympathy the first time one tried to suck my face off,” Coulson said.

“Yeah, that's my job,” Clint said, starting the painstaking process of recovering every bit of the arrow. The net couldn't be reused, but he'd worked so many undercover SHIELD operations at this point that leaving any fragment of his tech or weaponry behind made him twitchy. Besides, the broken pieces of the net canister made excellent robotic vacuum cleaner bait.

“C'mon, sir, they make great pets. Clever, obedient, pick up messes instead of making them,” Clint said, crouching down next to the hockey puck shaped robot, pulling a Sharpie from a pocket of his battle suit. “Better than a dog.”

“True. At least the Roomba won't lick me, sniff my crotch or hump my leg,” Coulson said, triggering his SHIELD communicator.

“All of those are my jobs, too,” Clint said just as Coulson opened his mouth to speak. Coulson froze, mouth open, ears turning red, for just a split second. Clint took gleeful pride in the look of death that Coulson shot in his direction. Grinning, unrepentant, he scribbled 'Robbie' on the Roomba.

“We've got another one ready for containment.” Coulson said, his voice as cool and controlled as always. Clint stood, tucking the marker back into his pocket and turning back towards Coulson just in time to be slammed back into the wall, Coulson's arm across his chest, Coulson's body hard against his, Coulson's face deeply into his personal space. “Yes. Deactivated. How many more are missing?” Coulson said into the comm, as if his knee wasn't between Clint's legs, his lips almost touching Clint's ear.

Clint's head fell back against the wall with an audible thunk, earning him a sharp bite on the neck, just under the collar of his flack vest. He choked on a whimper, because, damn, yes. 

“I understand, we'll head to the north hall and see if we can head them off.” Coulson cut the communication and narrowed his eyes at Clint, who grinned back. “You love pushing your luck, don't you, Barton?” he asked, one eyebrow arching with just the slightest upward tic.

“Oh, God, yes, sir,” Clint said with a straight face, even though he knew his cheeks were flushed and his pupils were blown wide with need. “Every fucking chance I get.”

Coulson's lips twitched, and he leaned his forehead on Clint's shoulder, sucking in a deep breath. Clint stroked a hand up the back of the man's neck, the fingers of his archery glove rough on the short hair there. “You will be the death of me,” Phil managed, and captured Clint's mouth.

The kiss was hot, and hard and almost brutal, and Clint's lips parted under Phil's eagerly, letting the senior agent's tongue tangle with his, even as his hands slipped under Phil's jacket. His fingers found the camoflaged muscle and groaned into Phil's mouth. Phil's leg pressed up higher and harder between Clint's, finding the hard line of Clint's erection and giving him the friction he needed to send heat spiraling through his blood.

“Hard already?” he whispered into Clint's mouth, one hand sliding through Clint's hair.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Clint gasped out, his head falling back as Phil's mouth moved down his jaw, down the column of his neck, his hips rocking into Phil's body. “I've been like this since you stepped in front of my arrow.”

“You always get off on the trust thing. It's kind of hot,” Phil said, his fingers brushing at the skin just below Clint's waistband, making the younger man moan. “Clint?”

“Yeah?” Clint said, head spinning.

Coulson lifted his head and smiled at Clint. “Not at work,” Phil said, and released Clint with staggering suddenness, stepping back and smoothing his hair down with one steady hand. There was a faint hint of color to his cheekbones and his pupils were wide, but other than that, he was utterly composed.

Clint made a pathetic little whimpering noise, locking his knees to keep from ending up in a heap on the floor.

“There are not nice words for men like you,” Clint managed to choke out, trying to get some of his blood back into his head. It wasn't happening, but he had to at least try.

“Don't make me report you to HR for unprofessional language,” Coulson said, and he was smirking, the damn bastard was smirking. 

It took all of Clint's willpower not to jump him and start ripping off that perfect Dolce suit.

“Is that a roleplay thing? Because I've heard of 'Principal and Naughty Student,' but 'HR Rep and the Sexual Harassment Investigation' is a new one for me.” Clint paused, one eyebrow arching. “Huh. Actually, I can get behind that... You bring the forms, I'll bring the attitude.”

Phil gave him a look. “Do you ever stop?”

“Is that a no?”

Coulson paused. “We'll see,” he said at last.

“And that is a solid yes, we are going to misuse official SHIELD paperwork so badly. So. Very. Badly.” Clint spread his arms. “Oh, baby, yes, baby. File me. File me hard.”

And even Coulson's perfect poker face couldn't hold up to that, cracking as he started to laugh. “You are an idiot. Why do I love you, again?”

“It's one of the mysteries of the world, sir.” Clint shouldered his bow. “I suspect it's because you have trashy, trashy tastes.”

Coulson opened his mouth to reply, and his SHIELD comm unit chirped. Giving Clint a look, he triggered it. “Yes, sir?” He frowned. “Understood. We're on our way.” He cut the connection. “Grab your 'baby,' Barton. Fury wants to see us.”

“Let's be clear, he doesn't want to see us. He needs to see us. Probably because he's found something for me to shoot.”

“Either way, the end result's the same. Let's go.”

*

The reality of the situation was that they were fighting a losing battle. Tony Stark had, in fact, engineered a semi-intelligent mini-army of flying robotic vacuum cleaners. The Avengers had in fact used said Roomba Army to take out a building sized Dust Bunny of Doom, and the Roombas had been sent to the SHIELD R&D department. They were kept in isolation while the evil ball of rage was extracted from them, which had gone far better than anyone could've anticipated.

Then the Roombas had escaped. No one knew how or why, but all of a sudden, SHIELD was overrun, and the Avengers had been called in to deal with Tony's mess. Because someone had to, and as with most things Tony, SHIELD just wasn't equipped to do it.

“We're still missing fifty-eight of these damn things,” Fury said, leaning over his desk, his hands folded on the top. “Even with the full staff sweeping the corridors, we've managed to find just under thirty of them. Stark figured out that most of the missing ones appear to have slipped into the ventilation system. Short of blowing them all out through the vents and probably doing an amazing amount of damage to the building structure, I've got no choice but to send someone in after them.”

Clint blinked at him. “Wait, what, why are they in the vents?”

“I don't know,” Fury said, standing up and stalking around the desk. “Why do you always end up in the vents?”

“So I can torment my cowork-,” Clint said, and Coulson cleared his throat behind his back. “I mean, so that I can maintain a firm grasp on my skills of infiltration and-”

“You do it to be a dick,” Fury said, cutting him off. “Which makes you ideally suited for this particular mission. Go get equipped and move it out.”

“Wait,” Clint said, eyes narrowing. “Are you giving me permission to go into the air ducts? Didn't you say that you'd sell me to trolls for soup stock if you ever caught me in there again?”

“It didn't stop you,” Fury said.

“You just said you couldn't CATCH me in there, not that I couldn't GO in there, there is a world of difference between these two things, Jesus, sir, you should know that semantics are everything in this business.” Clint rocked on his heels, every muscle in his body suddenly tense in that 'I'm going to get to have fun' way that he so loved. “But now you're... You're not just giving me permission. You are ordering me.” Clint braced the fingers of one hand on his forehead, eyes closed, as he held his other palm towards Fury, as if he was overwhelmed, and maybe some small, childish part of him was. “I'm afraid I'm going to need you to state that order a little more clearly, sir, just so that there is no confusion later.”

“Barton, you are on my last fucking nerve right now.”

“Troll soup, sir, I really, really need this to follow SHIELD protocol, because you are asking me to disobey a direct order that's in my file right now, that I am not to crawl through the ceilings and the vents of any official SHIELD facility.” Clint gave his boss his best shit-eating grin.

Fury looked at Coulson, singular eye narrowed. “When this is over,” he said, “I'm trading him to the CIA for a paper shredder.”

“Don't be ridiculous, sir, you can get at least a surveillance van for him,” Coulson said, eyebrows arched.

“Fine, you can both find someone else to crawl through the vents,” Clint said, shrugging. “Someone else intimately familiar with the layout. Someone without any tendency towards claustrophobia. Someone who knows all the weak spots and junctures and danger spots and has ammunition hidden in various locations throughout the building.” He fluttered his eyelashes like the tease he was. “Good luck with that.”

Fury sighed, ran a hand over his face with sharp roughness. “Barton?”

“Yes, sir?” Clint said, all but vibrating with eagerness. 

“I am ordering you to go into the vents and clear out the Roomba infestation.”

“And you said you didn't get me anything for my birthday, sir,” Clint said, throwing an arm around Fury's shoulders. “You are... You are a beautiful man.”

“Barton, I have a death certificate pre-signed by the last head of medical that you pissed off, and it lists your cause of death as misadventure by firearm.”

“I am not liking the sound of that,” Clint admitted.

“I will publish an obit listing that you blew yourself up with one of your own goddamn arrows, and I will publish it before I kill you, so you can suffer through the indignity, if you do not get your hand off of me and go corral the rest of these goddamn machines!”

“He makes a convincing case,” Clint said to Coulson, who flicked his eyes at the ceiling, an eyeroll without the effort.

“That's why he's in charge. Go, Barton.”

Clint snapped him a salute. “Sir, I live to serve.” 

“Serve, or you won't live much longer,” Fury told him.

“Why is everyone in such a mood today?” Clint said to no one in particular. “Really. Am I the only one having fun here?”

“Yes,” Coulson told him. “Go.”

Grinning, Clint loped off to arm himself. He'd barely set foot outside of Fury's office when Tony Stark fell into step beside him. “Oh, it is never good when you show up,” Clint said, giving the other man a sideways look. “Dare I ask?”

“Dare, dare,” Tony said. “Fury sending you in after the rest of the Roombas?”

“Yeah, no one else is stupid enough to want to go crawling around the vents. Any particular reason why I have to go after them, Stark?”

“That's what I wanted to talk to you about.” Tony jerked his head towards a door at the end of the hallway, and, amused, Clint followed him in. When the door shut behind them, he glanced around the supply closet. 

“Look, Stark, it's not that you're not an attractive man, really, you are, but we're just too similar for this relationship to amount to anything, and I'm fucking sick of one night stands or fumbling trysts in supply closets,” Clint said with a straight face. “Also, I do not want to be known as the guy who made Captain America burst into tears in public.”

“What?” Tony asked, frowning. He glanced around, and figured it out. “Try not to be a smartass for like five minutes, can you please?”

“Honestly, no, I cannot.”

“Fine, just shut up and save your questions and comments for the end of the tour.” Tony leaned against the shelves, his arms folded over his chest. “There's something wrong.”

“I'm about to crawl into the air vents of a top secret government agency's headquarters to retrieve more than fifty AI upgraded flying robotic vacuum cleaners,” Clint said. “When you say, 'there's something wrong,' you're gonna have to narrow it down a bit.”

“Fine. I thought that showing up and giving Jarvis full access to the system would correct the issue. Fury refuses to let us into the system, not all the way, because he's a paranoid motherfucker-”

“And also because you would use your full access for evil.”

“Evil is such a harsh word, I prefer expediency,” Tony said. “But yes, he refuses to let StarkTech or Jarvis fully into the security or surveillance systems of SHIELD. So when the Roombas got loose from the R&D department, I thought that it was just because that there was no strong controlling force to keep them in line. All that it should've taken to correct the problem was letting Jarvis in the system so he could order them back onto the reservation, so to speak.”

“But that didn't work.”

“That didn't work,” Tony agreed. “They are flat out refusing to obey. Which means that their primary protocol systems have been triggered to the point where even Jarvis can't override it.”

“And that would be?”

“That would be, 'find the biggest mess you can and don't stop until the mess is dealt with,'” Tony explained. His fingers were rolling in a nervous series of taps against his bicep. Beneath his dark brows, his eyes were sharp, focused inward, and Clint could almost see the code sequence running through his mind. All nervous tension and staccato bursts of energy, Tony was a lot of fun to watch, except, of course, when he was in the process of getting the whole team killed.

“That's pretty vague,” Clint said. Not to mention worrying.

“Yeah, well, I expected Jarvis to be riding herd on them, so I kinda got lazy when it came to providing them with strict parameters,” Tony said, waving a hand in mid-air, displeasure obvious in his pout. “They weren't ever supposed to leave the tower, but then, well, life happened, and none of this was anticipated. I cannot imagine how anyone would expect me to anticipate it.”

Clint snapped his fingers. “Can we please focus here?” he said. “So you think they went looking for a mess?”

“I think they found one. There are almost sixty of them still missing, Clint. And the ones we have captured and deactivated appeared to have a purpose in mind. They're vacuum cleaners, and I haven't found a single one in the act of, I don't know, vacuuming?” Tony gave Clint a sharp glance. “You?”

“No,” Clint said, eyes narrowing. “They've all been in flight.”

“They aren't cleaning. They're heading towards something, their hive mind has found a mess and all of the remaining bots are heading for it. They're not doing their job right now, because something has taken precedence over taking care of SHIELD's rugs.” Tony's eyes came up to meet Clint's. “They found something. In the vents. They won't obey Jarvis, they won't clean, because they found a mess. And it's gotta be a hell of a mess.”

“And you don't know what it is?” Clint asked.

“No. I can't get a solid connection to check their auditory or visual sensors. If you get close enough, you might be able to do that for me.”

“Oh, wonderful,” Clint groused. He rubbed a hand through his hair. “I take it you told Fury about this?”

“Of course I did,” Tony said. “And you know what he had to say about it.”

“Hmmm, let me think,” Clint said. He let his voice fall to a low, raspy timbre. “There's no way anything's happening in the vents, Stark, SHIELD's security is the best on the goddamn planet.”

“You are my brother by a different mother,” Tony said, teeth flashing in a wide grin. “Have you considered a goatee?”

“The beard is what makes you the evil one.” Clint straightened up. “What's the over under on this? You tell Cap?”

“Figured I'd let you know what's up before I talked to him. If I tell him, you're not going in, you know that. He won't let you go alone.” Tony gave him a look. “You know those vents better than anyone except maybe the guys who constructed the building, and knowing Fury, he had them killed to keep things secret. What're the chances of getting you backup if something goes wrong?”

“Natasha, sure. You, if you can take the tight spaces-”

“I spend my life fighting in a glorified tin can, I do not have problems with claustrophobia,” Tony said.

“Then, yes, you can make it. Not a chance Cap or Thor can maneuver in there, and I would strongly advise against letting Bruce try. It gets tight, and even I get a little panicky from time to time. If he were to Hulk out in there, no way we could get off without any major structural damage.”

“So, Natasha and me.”

“Coulson, too, but I wouldn't trust many of the other agents,” Clint said. “But honestly, Tony, I'm going in by myself at first. I know what I'm doing, and the rest of you are not going to be a help.”

“Yeah, I figured.” Tony arched an eyebrow. “Got something for you.”

“Again, I need your pants to remain on here.”

“Darling, it's too big to fit in my pants,” Tony drawled, reaching up on the shelf. There was a black case tucked behind a gigantic box of post-its, and underneath a stash of white out bottles. Tony pulled it down and dropped it to the ground, crouching down to flip the case open. 

“It's like a JRPG, I'm getting outfitted by a creepy guy in a closet,” Clint said, even as he crouched down next to Tony, eager despite the mockery. Internally he was doing the 'New StarkToys, new StarkToys' dance, but it was never a good idea to be too eager around Tony, he thrived on flipping off anyone who underestimated him and couldn't resist showing up anyone who didn't appreciate his work.

Basically, the best way to get Tony to build him something new and awesome was to seriously imply that Clint didn't think he could. Tony would half kill himself to prove him wrong, and moon Clint as he delivered on twice as much as he'd thought humanly possible.

“Keep it up, and I'll start demanding payment,” Tony shot back. “Or send you on pointless quests to fulfill requirements before I let you have access to the new toys.” He pulled out something that looked like one of Natasha's wrist cuffs. “Suit up.”

He tossed it to Clint, who caught it in midair. He flipped it over in his hands, curious. Light, flexible, but with an internal structure that he couldn't figure out. Tony made an impatient gesture with one hand, and rolling his eyes, Clint slipped it onto his right arm.

Tony moved close to adjust it. “Tighten it here,” he said, showing Clint the hidden slide in the mechanism. He flipped it and the thing snapped into place, just tight enough that it wasn't moving, but not so much that it was painful. It seemed to flow into the structure of his arm, almost as thin as his arm guard and leaving the wrist free to move normally. “Release the same way. Emergency, break this and it'll fall apart, so don't let it get caught,” Tony said, showing him a tab that rested on the inside of Clint's wrist.

“Control mechanism's here,” Tony said, tossing him an archery glove. “It's based on your current one, so don't worry, it won't interfere with your usual firing.” He waited for Clint to trade it out for the one that he was wearing, flexing his fingers and checking the fit and the stretch. “Make a fist and press down on the side of your pointer finger like you're pressing a button you're holding.”

“What?” Clint asked, staring at him.

“Just do it, smartass.” Tony grabbed his right arm and held it up at shoulder level.

With a shrug, Clint did what he was told and nearly jumped out of his skin as the wrist cuff seemed to shift around his skin. “Fuck me!” he said, jerking backwards.

Tony kept a firm grip on his arm. “Tempting, but no. Jesus, Barton, stop being such a baby, it's just reformatted nanotech, it's not going to kill you.”

“Anything you make has the potential to kill me!” Barton relaxed as the cuff stopped moving, and he held up his arm, eyes huge. Something that resembled a crossbow structure had formed on the back of his wrist, and he held his arm out, sighting down the length. “Is this your attempt to make everyone do that stupid repulsor move that you love so much?”

“I don't run out of ammo,” Tony pointed out. “Controls are in the glove. Flexing your fingers adjusts the draw and power, flicking your thumb adjusts the ammo push, and making a fist fires.” He nodded at the upper shelf. “Give it a try.”

Clint gave him a suspicious look, but did as he was told, holding up his right arm and flexing his fingers, then snapping his hand into a fist. A bright energy bolt streaked across the supply closet, hitting the box of notepads. It tore through, leaving a neat hole behind. “Huh.” Clint grinned, lowering his arm.

Rotating his shoulder, he swung his arm around, left hand flickering as he tried it out, leaving a dozen precise holes in the paper supplies. It fired fast and true, the bolts not anything that he was experienced with, but the flex of the cuff on his wrist wasn't dissimilar from the recoil of a bow, his muscles already adapting.

“Just out of curiosity, has this been tested?” Clint said, aiming and flicking the fingers of his left hand, adjusting to the controls with amazing speed, the muscles of his hands and arms adjusting to the tech 'bow' as if he'd been practicing for years. It was enough to make him a bit dizzy. 

“Have you ever seen it before?”

“No.”

“Have I ever let anyone touch your tech?”

“Fuck, no.”

“There's your answer,” Tony said, with a shrug. “Wasn't planning on handing it over just yet, but where you're going, your draw angle and range is going to be, shall we say, extremely limited.” He paused, mouth tightening. “I based it on your natural movements, so it's built around what you're already used to doing. It should be easy enough to use. Don't depend on it fully, but it'll hold you in a bad spot. There's not enough force to do major damage to anything big, you can feel the recoil enough to know that, but at full force, you should be able to make a dent on anything going for your throat.”

Clint flicked his fingers, and the energy bolt struck the post-it notes stack dead center. “It's all in what I can hit,” he said, rolling his shoulders. “I might not be able to get through bone or armor, but it can take out an eye.”

“I do love how you always think positive.” Tony was back in the case, digging like the demented ferret that he was. “Take these.”

Making the same button press movement with his left hand, Clint retracted the 'bow.' He held out his hand, catching the small discs that rolled out of Tony's palm. He checked them over. “Give me a hint here.”

“Circuit upgrades,” Tony said. “If you manage to catch one of the Roombas, flip it on its back like a turtle and find something that looks like this. Pry it lose and replace it with one of these. It'll cut the connection to Jarvis and the Roomba hive mind, but make it smart enough to actually obey verbal commands. A true AI enabled Roomba.”

“Are we talking Dummy or Jarvis here?”

“Somewhere in between.” Tony gave him a look when Clint groaned. “Look, I know I make this look easy, poison dart frog, but you do realize that creating an actual functional AI is incredibly difficult? Like, something only half a dozen human beings on this planet can do? And none of them do it so fast and so well and with such style as I do, so shut the hell up before I give your gear to the nearest summer camp.”

“Overreact much?” Clint asked, grinning.

“I will make it my goal in life to ruin you, you do understand that, don't you?”

“Do you have anything else for me, Q, or can the rest of my tech briefing wait until after I seduce the Bond girl?”

“I'm telling Natasha you called her that,” Tony said. “Am I telling Cap or not?”

“Give me a head start.”

“Coulson?”

Inwardly, Clint flinched. “I can deal with that,” he said. “One of my best access points to the ventilation system is actually in Coulson's office. I've got a stash there. I can snag my stuff and give him a brief.” He COULD, but he wasn't GOING to. There would be hell to pay later, but for now, he wanted to dig his way through this mess without Coulson pacing in his office behind him.

“Gotcha,” Tony said, already losing interest. He snapped the case closed and swung it up over his shoulder. “I need to know what they're facing. As soon as you find anything, let me know.”

“As soon as I know, you'll know,” Clint agreed. “Thanks, Tony.”

“Be careful, I do not want to try to explain to the rest of the team if you get hurt doing this,” Tony said, opening the door back to the hallway.

And nearly ran facefirst into Captain America.

Steve blinked down at him, and then over his shoulder at Clint, who gave him a grin and a cheerful little flicker of his fingers. And then beyond that to the rather disordered supply closet. A muscle in his cheek twitched, and he opened his mouth. He shut it, brows drawing up in an expression of confusion and something that looked like disappointment.

“Hey, Steve!” Clint said, slapping Tony on the back. “Thanks, man, that was great,” he said to Tony, who just gaped at him, and pushed past both of them, because their idiotic mutual admiration society was just getting laughable. He'd seen friends caught in the throes of unrequited love before, but he'd never seen two people be in unrequited love with each other. To be honest, up until they all moved into the Avengers turf of Stark Tower, he would've said that it wasn't possible; that there was no way that two different people could be that oblivious at the SAME TIME.

Tony Stark and Steve Rogers were a constant source of consternation and delight. They also made him feel so much better about his own emotional stability, because, Jesus. What a pair of morons.

Tony would kill him for it later, of course, but hey, if they stood any chance of pushing this whole 'will one of you make a goddamn move already?' thing through, Clint's money was on Steve. The man knew how to take an acceptable risk. 

For now, however, he had Roombas to wrangle. Putting a bit of swagger in his steps, he headed for Coulson's office.


	2. Chapter 2

"It's not what it looks like," Tony said.

"I wasn't thinking it looked like anything," Steve said with a pleasant smile. It seemed a little strained at the edges. "Uh, I was wondering if we have an update about the movements of the rest of the Roombas?" he said, and the abrupt change of subject, and the fact that he was avoiding Tony's eyes, made Tony's stomach clench in a hard knot.

Tony shifted his case from one hand to the other. "I wasn't- I mean, we were just-" His voice trailed away. Shit. Shit shit shit, what could he say they were doing? In a supply closet? At SHIELD? That didn't seem creepy or against HR policy or, ugh, him and CLINT? That could technically count as just plain unnatural, neither one of them would be able to shut up long enough to actually do anything that would count as sex. Their entire relationship would just be the two of the squawking at each other. Not exactly sexy times. 

Also, no. God, no.

"I had a new piece of tech for him," Tony said, because hey! Truth! That would work out, wouldn't it?

Steve glanced at him, frowning. "You had a new piece of tech for him. That you gave him... In a closet?" he asked at last, and then shrugged, because he was Steve, and he was always willing to give his teammates the benfit of the doubt, if they deserved it or not. "What is it?"

"Uh, a mini-bow, or I guess you could call it a mini bow, it's just-" Tony made a gesture with one hand. "Like a wrist cuff." Wow. Even his truths have started sounding like lies. He probably should work on that, but the utter sense of panic right now was not helping him keep it together.

"So, it's a bow.”

“Kinda. Not really.”

“So it's not a bow?” Steve asked, sounding confused now.

"It is. Of a type."

And Steve was clearly done trying to figure out that part of the conversation, which, thank God, meant that Tony could, too. "Why would you give him a weapon in a closet? If you'd gone to the range, he could test it." Steve paused, lips getting tight. “I thought we'd had this discussion, Tony, tests for weaponry should really be under control conditions.”

“It's fine, I tested it thoroughly before I gave it to him. There wasn't time for range tests.”

“Why not?”

Tony opened his mouth and remembered that he wasn't supposed to be telling Steve about the fact that Clint was currently en route to fight an unknown evil in the bowels of SHIELD's ventilation system. Alone. With untested tech, because, yeah, he'd lied through his teeth about testing it thoroughly. He'd made sure it wouldn't blow up before he'd sent Clint off with it, but that was about the only think he could promise; that Clint was carrying semi-stable tech into an unknown situation without backup. And both their team leader and their team handler were still in the dark about the situation.

In retrospect, promising Clint he'd give him a head start was one of the stupidest things Tony had ever done.

The silence stretched out, and Steve's face got tight. "Don't worry about it, Tony," he said, and he smiled, and it was that painfully thin smile that meant that he was faking it. Because he thought Tony was lying. Tony stared at him, trying to make sense of that, that he'd told the damn truth and somehow he was so bad at it that he Steve still thought he was lying. Steve cleared his throat. "I'm glad for you. Really."

"Don't be-" Tony winced as his voice rose to a truly unfortunate pitch. "Don't be GLAD for me, Jesus, that is the worst thing."

"What am I supposed to do, chew you out for-" Steve waved a hand in the general direction of the closet door. "Doing whatever in the supply closet? At work?" And his face was red, his jaw was tight. “I may be the team leader, but I'm leaving that up to Coulson.” His mouth twisted. “As long as everyone's happy, then I'm just going to-” His hands flexed at his sides. “Be happy for you.”

"I wasn't-"

"It's fine," Steve said, cutting him off, and turned around, moving away with long, hard strides. "Really. I'm glad for you."

"Steve-"

"Clint? Really, Clint?" Steve said, whipping back around so fast that Tony actually crashed into him. "Tony, really-" He pushed a hand through his hair. "Clint?"

"What's wrong with Clint?" Tony said, a little defensive, because Steve was looking at him with an expression that was somewhere between disappointment and dismay. Like Tony had made bad choices, which was true, it was always true, but still, what the hell?

"Nothing's wrong with-" Steve's teeth snapped together with an audible click. "There's nothing wrong with Clint, you know there's nothing wrong with Clint. There's something wrong with you being with Clint."

"I would say I just walked into this conversation at the wrong time, but I'm fairly certain there was never a good time to walk into this conversation," Bruce said, making both Steve and Tony jump. He was pushing a small cart piled with Roombas and was trailed by Thor, who was considering them both with wide eyes. "Everything okay, guys?"

"It's fine," Steve said. "Have we found-"

"What do you mean, something wrong with me being with Clint?" Tony asked, frustrated now. "What, you don't think I'm good enough for Clint?"

"That's not what I was saying at all, my God, Tony, can you just drop it?" Steve snapped.

Bruce's eyebrows arched. "Okay, I really need context for this conversation," he said, his voice calm and soothing. "Let's take a step back from each other and just-"

“No, no, I can't drop it,” Tony snapped, so goddamn confused and frustrated that he just wanted to scream. “Because, honestly, I'd think you'd be HAPPY that if I actually started sleeping with someone who actually liked me, liked me, not my position or my money or the suit, but someone who could actually sit on the couch with me and watch bad movies or eat pizza in some dive in Queens, or remind me to sleep or eat or make me do something other than sit in board meetings or rebuild the gauntlets, or, I don't know, what is so wrong with having a relationship with your friend?” he asked, because yes, that was what he wanted, and he was never going to get it, because short of losing his mind and crawling naked into Steve's bed, he was never going to do anything about it because if Steve rejected him, he wasn't sure he could survive losing Steve's friendship, so he was never going to do anything about it.

Ever.

Steve was looking at him with a faint smile. “You're right,” he said, reaching out to clasp Tony's shoulder.

Tony blinked. “I am?”

“Yes. You're right. You do deserve that.” Steve's smile stretched, and it was a real smile this time, a real one ful of warmth and kindness and compassion. He reached out and hugged Tony, who still wasn't sure what was happening. “I'm so happy for you. Really.”

“Okay,” Tony said, because, mmmmmmm Steve hugs were the best hugs. When Steve pulled away, he nearly stumbled forward, almost landed on his face. He struggled to pull himself together.

“I have to go... Deal with the Roombas,” Steve said. “I'll talk to you later.”

“Okay,” Tony repeated, smiling at Steve's rapidly retreating back.

"Stark?" Bruce said.

Oh, God, Bruce and Thor were there, what the hell, how had he forgotten that? "What?" Tony snapped at him, defensive.

"Did you just talk Steve INTO believing you're sleeping with Clint Barton?"

"No!" Tony paused, replayed the conversation. "FUCK. Maybe. I don't know. Yes. I think I did, what the hell, brain, what the hell is wrong with me, why would I have done that?" He clutched his head with both hands. "Oh, my God!" He turned around to smack his forehead against the wall.

Bruce sighed as he loaded the Roomba onto his cart. “Stark, your life is an episode of 'Three's Company,' I swear to God.” 

“You take that back right now,” Tony said. “I will put up with a lot of insults, but I am absolutely not going to be compared to that nonsense, what the hell, where do you get these comparisons?”

“He is correct!” Thor said, his eyes wide. “Many lessons can be taken from the escapades of Jack and his lovely lady friends!”

“No. NO, Thor.” Because the thought of Thor watching, and no doubt laughing at, one of the stupidest things ever produced by American popular culture was enough to make him slam his forehead into the wall a second time. He followed through on the impulse, and it didn't help.

Bruce shook his head, sympathetic but dismayed. “How do you get yourself into these messes? Do you have no control over your mouth at all? No concept of how to stop talking?”

“Shut up now,” Tony snarled. His head bounced off the wall again. And again. “You're not helping.”

“Friend Tony, you must cease,” Thor said, sounding worried. “No matter how dark the day, there is no cause to harm one's self.”

“Listen, buddy, this doesn't even count as self-harm, let me tell you, I have done self-harm, I will continue doing self-harm, and this is a minor display of annoyance with no possible outlet other than trying.” He smacked his forehead on the wall. “To knock.” Thud. “Down a wall.” THUD. “With my face.” Thud, thud, thud.

Thor inserted his hand between Tony's head and the wall, a faint sigh escaping him.

“That's a temporary stop gap measure at best,” Bruce told him.

“Aye, and yet, better than allowing him to dent his mighty brain or the blameless wall,” Thor said.

“Maybe we should make him a nice padded room somewhere,” Bruce said.

“I fucking hate you both,” Tony said, his head resting on Thor's huge palm.

“I understand, Man of Iron,” Thor said, patting his head with his free hand. “Come. We will find you a sweet pastry and your favorite beverage. All will be well.”

“I don't wanna date Clint,” Tony said, morose as Thor pulled him away from the wall and steered him down the hall. “He's mean and he steals my stuff and he makes fun of my robots and sometimes he jumps off of buildings without telling me he's going to do it and then I have a heart attack and Steve yells at me and Coulson yells at me and Natasha yells at me and I can just imagine that dating Clint will only result in more people yelling at me.” He paused. “I don't want to date Clint.”

“Tony,” Bruce said, his voice low and gentle, his dark eyes sympathetic. He waited until Tony was looking at him and then he smiled. “You're not dating Clint.”

“Oh, thank fucking God,” Tony said, meaning it.

“Oooooookay,” Bruce said. “You want to stick with him, Thor, and I'll go catch up with Steve?”

“Aye,” Thor said, his hands on Tony's shoulders. “Come, my friend, we shall discuss matters of the heart over a beverage of warm chocolate and much whipped cream.”

“That sounds nice,” Tony said, and how pathetic was his life that, yes, it really did.

*

Natasha resisted the urge to put a heel through the metal casing of the Roomba. This one had been particularly difficult. She was torn between wanting it dead and wanting to reward it for its cleverness. Right now, dead was winning, but it was deactivated, and there was something that struck her as unfair about breaking it down to its components while it was unable to fight back. Scooping it up, she headed down the corridor, back towards SHIELD's R&D department.

Maybe she would speak to Stark about keeping this one as a sparring partner. If he could find some way to arm it...

Lost in her thoughts, she caught only the end of the conversation between the two passing SHIELD agents. It wasn't until she heard 'Barton' that she stopped, spinning on her heel. “What was that?”

The two agents froze, and she stalked back to them. “What was that?” she repeated, when neither of them was immediately forthcoming.

The taller, and older of the two agents just gaped at her, his face stark white and his eyes huge in his terrified face. Natasha resisted the urge to roll her eyes or yell 'boo.' Switching her attention to the other agent, who looked confused but not traumatized, she smiled.

Junior agents. They were always the most fun to play with, because no matter how many times someone told them how things worked, they never believed it. 

“What was that?” she asked for the third time, swaying towards the Junior Agent. He blinked, pupils dialating and mouth dropping open just enough for him to look like he'd taken a blow to the head. Which, if Natasha was being smug, he had.

“Uh, what?” he asked, blinking down at her.

The standards of this place were dropping. Natasha made a mental note to bring this up with Coulson because, really, she did not want to go into the field with this moron providing backup.

“You were saying something just now,” she said, letting her annoyance show only in the faint fluttering of her eyelashes. “Something about Clint Barton? What was that?”

“Nothing,” the older agent blurted, grabbing his compatriot by the arm and trying to tug him away. “Sorry, ma'am, we weren't saying anything, really.” He gave a hard pull, but his colleague might as well have been glued to the ground.

“I was saying that Captain America caught Barton and Stark naked in the supply closet on the executive floors,” the agent said, smiling at Natasha.

Natasha blinked, the flicker of her eyelids the only sign that he'd actually managed to surprise her. She thought about that for a moment, trying to make it work in any logical sense, and failed. Her lips twitched. She made a breathy, soft sound that could've been mistaken for a sigh.

It was actually a laugh.

“Really,” she said. “Steve found Tony and Clint in a supply closet. Naked.” The junior agent nodded, his head snapping back and forth on his neck hard enough that Natasha was pretty sure he was going to hurt himself. “And Clint's still alive?” She considered the full implications of the situation, and arched her eyebrows. “Actually, the fact that Stark's still alive is probably more remarkable.”

“What?” the agent said, confusion washing over his features.

Natasha waved him off. “Never mind. When was this?”

“Uh, today?”

She shook her head. “Of course. Thank you.” She patted his cheek, her fingers delicate on his skin, and then pushed the Roomba up against his chest. “Be a dear and run this down to R&D for me, will you please?” With a faint smile, she turned away from them, heading up the hall.

Halfway to Coulson's office, Steve nearly barreled into her. She dodged him with ease, her body slipping around him without even thinking about it. Despite the fact that he didn't actually hit her, Steve skidded to a stop, already apologizing. Natasha waved him off with a flick of her wrist. “It's fine,” she said, with a faint smile. “Has another one of Stark's toys been spotted?”

Steve flinched. 

Natasha's eyes narrowed. “Steve,” she said, her voice gentle. “Have you been listening to the junior agents gossip?”

“There's gossip?” he asked, and his voice rose an alarming degree on the two short words. “How is there gossip? I was the only one there when-” He snapped his mouth shut, and Natasha stared at him, her eyebrows scraping her hairline.

Now, that was interesting.

“Steve!” 

They both paused, looking back, as Bruce jogged up the corridor. He gave Natasha a faint smile. “How's the hunting?” he asked her.

“Picked off three more. They're very tricky. Probably has something to do with their programmer,” Natasha said. She folded her arms. “Speaking of which, I just heard some of the junior agents talking about him and Barton? Something about a closet?”

“Yeah, no,” Bruce said, as Steve turned and stalked away. “Stark is an idiot,” he said on a sigh.

“That's true. So's Barton.”

“I suspect at least some of this is him just messing with Steve, which was not very nice, please smack him for me when you see him next.”

“I can handle that,” Natasha said. “Are you going to-” She jerked her head in Steve's direction.

“I'll go talk him down,” Bruce said, his shoulders hunched. “Thor's got Stark down in the cafeteria.”

“I'll deal with the rest,” Natasha said on a faint sigh.

“What's the rest?”

“Never mind.” She flicked a hand after Steve. “Better catch up to him before he catches some idiot of a baby agent embellishing it into something involving blow jobs in Fury's office or three ways or three ways in Fury's office with Fury.”

“Oh, God,” Bruce said, and took off at a fast jog.

“I'm on a team with a bunch of teenage boys,” Natasha said aloud to no one in particular. “How did this happen?” Shaking her head, she padded off to head off the rest of their problems.

Natasha gave the door a perfunctory knock and slipped in without waiting to be invited. Behind his desk, Coulson glanced up at her with just a single raised eyebrow. “Yes, Romanoff?” he asked. “Can this possibly wait? I just got here a minute ago and I have about twenty pounds of paperwork to deal with right now.”

She ignored the hint to leave. She folded herself up on his couch, leaning against the arm in a languid recline. “So,” she said, eyelashes dipping. “Clint and Tony.”

“I hope they'll be very happy together,” Coulson said, scribbling a few notes on the form in front of him.

Natasha's eyes narrowed. “Oh, Coulson.”

“Natasha?” he replied, eyebrows arching.

“You cannot believe-” She choked on a laugh. “Clint. And Tony. No.”

“They're both lovely boys,” Coulson said with a straight face. “Lovely couple. We must have them over for dinner some night.”

Natasha hid a smile behind a yawn. “Just because every other person within the confines of Stark Tower and SHIELD is completely oblivious, don't lump me in with them. I am well aware that you are enthusiastically sleeping with the asset, Agent Coulson.”

“First, not officially his handler any more,” he said with a faint smile. “Second, don't ever call him an 'asset' again, and third, I do believe that's none of your business.”

"Don't try to put one over on me," Natasha said, eying him, not the least bit bothered by the set-down. "I was there at the beginning of this relationship of yours."

"No, you weren't, actually."

"Fine," she said, waving a languid hand in his direction. "I was there for the beginning of the romantic part of it."

"That is also incorrect."

She grinned. "Well, I was there when you drugged him, kidnapped him, and handcuffed him to an office chair, how's that?"

"Well, when you put it like that," Coulson said, smiling just a bit, "it all seems so sordid." He pulled a file from his drawer. "Besides, you weren't there. You were watching the getaway vehicle."

"Close enough; your relationship is like something out of a 1980's era soap opera. Don't get me wrong, Coulson, I'm quite pleased, I wouldn't have thought you had it in you." She rolled to her feet, slipped the pages from under his pen and set them aside. She took a seat on the edge of his desk. "He isn't going to cheat on you, Coulson."

He gave her a look. A 'your intelligence is lacking and your intel is, too,' look, directly from their field relationship. "Of course he's not."

"Good. Just so we're clear. I was a bit concerned when I found out that he and Stark actually were in a closet together, because, well, that wasn't something I was expecting."

Coulson's pen hit the desktop with a click. "Really. They were actually in the closet? This isn't just stupid SHIELD scuttlebutt that Clint started to annoy me, or Stark or Rogers?"

Natasha blinked at him. "Steve confirmed that he bumped into them when they were coming out."

"Really." Coulson stood. "Let's go."

She slid off the desk and fell into step behind him. "Coulson?"

"Why would Clint be in a closet with Tony?” he asked her, straightening his suit as he lead the way to the door. “There's a limited number of answers, and I don't like any of them, because Team Stark-Barton exists to give me an ulcer and force the creation of new and ever more complicated paperwork.”

“And yet you're still dating half of said team, what does that say about you?” she said, slipping into the hall so he could shut and lock the door.

“That I am clinically insane, and you dated him first.”

“Yes, but I broke up with him.”

“So I've heard. How many times, exactly?”

“Who could keep track of an exact number? There was always a reason to take him back,” she explained, with a purr in her voice. “One big reason to keep taking him back. I could also make a rather lewd comment about his stamina and talent in certain areas, but you don't seem like the sort to encourage locker room talk.”

“I'm going to assume by 'stamina' and 'talent' you're discussing his abilities as a sniper,” Coulson agreed. “I am not having this discussion with you.”

“And here I thought you'd want all the intel possible. I'm shocked,” Natasha said with a faint smirk. “Fine. When you're ready for girl talk, just let me know.”

“I appreciate it, Natasha. I'll pencil you in for never. How's that? Does never work for you?” Coulson raised his eyebrows at her. “Never works quite well for me.”

And she was not giggling, that would just be damn undignified, really.

*

Clint was not surprised when his earpiece chirped. He was a little surprised that it happened so fast, but then again, he had set Tony up pretty badly outside of that closet, and the man folded like wet tissue paper in a hurricane when Steve turned a disapproving glance in his direction.

If he could ever get Steve to use his powers for evil, the man could rule the damn world, really. It wasn't as if Clint wanted a friend to go the supervillain route, he just hated to see potential being wasted.

“Does it occur to you that if he set his mind to it, Steve could be a truly excellent supervillain?” Clint said into the comm unit, not bothering with any sort of segue. He knew very well who it was.

“We have a contingency plan in place for that,” Coulson said without missing a beat.

In the background, Steve said, “Wait, what?”

“Oh, c'mon.” Stark sounded seriously insulted. “If anyone here is going to go the black leather and weather control ray route, it's gonna be me, let's not even kid ourselves.”

“Every active SHIELD employee has a wallet card instructing them what to do in the event you go supervillain, Stark. It's standard equipment.”

A beat of silence. “What?” Tony asked.

“I got one,” Bruce said. “Want to see it?”

“If you show it to him, it'll defeat the purpose of having a plan,” Natasha said. “And I like this plan, it's a good plan, I do not want to go through them trying to come up with something else.”

“Yes, I want to see it,” Tony said. “Thor, did you get a card?”

“Verily. Their plan is most sound. I believe we will be able to subdue you with great swiftness, before you have much chance to hurt yourself or others. The damage to property will, of course, be massive, but such things are to be expected.”

“What the hell? You will not be able to subdue me quickly. Screw you, I am wily and brilliant.”

“I didn't get one,” Steve said, and there was a loud sound of no one being surprised. 

“It's not a good idea to warn the bait that-” Clint started, and Coulson cut him off with ruthless efficiency.

“Barton, do you want to tell us why you felt it was acceptable to go crawling off into the vents without updating myself or Captain Rogers with the new mission intel?”

“Way to hold out for all of ten minutes, Stark,” Clint said, still moving steadily forward. The darkness gave way to the small light he was wearing, providing a wide beam of gentle light, no strain on his eyes, no blind spots. Light and with a long battery life, it also recorded what he was seeing for later review. He'd adjusted the gear he carried in confined spaces over years of use, finding what worked, and what was comfortable. “Haven't you had the standard torture resistance training?”

“It's stuff like this that drives a man to a life of supervillainy.”

“We'll take our chances. Actually, Stark did exactly what he was supposed to do,” Coulson said, his jaw sounding overly tight. “He informed Fury, and he informed the operative involved. Do I agree with his decision to let the brain damaged operative in question make further decisions about his own health and safety? Not quite.”

“I know what I'm doing, and anyone else would just be in my way in here,” Clint said. He caught a cross bar and swung his body through a juncture, acrobatic training coming in handy as he twisted and folded himself back into crawling position. “Just because you felt the need to sign yourself up as my medical proxy, does not mean I take irrational chances with my health.”

“He walked out of the SHIELD medical unit with two broken legs,” Natasha explained to the rest of the team.

“Hairline fractures, don't exaggerate,” Clint said, sighing. 

“No, the hairline fracture was in your skull,” Coulson reminded him. “Though that did make it easy to get you declared legally incompetent.”

“I still can't believe you actually filed paperwork with the state.”

“I can't believe it took him so long,” Natasha said. 

“I'm just going to stay here in the vents, okay? Become SHIELD's version of the Phantom of the Opera.”

“Any signs of our missing Hockey Pucks of Doom?” Tony asked, sounding like he was just at the end of his rope. Likely he was. It had been a long week.

“Not yet. You made the damn things too clever.” He heard something new, the faint sound humming down the length of the metal ductwork, and his head came around. “May have something.” As he crawled forward, he said to Tony, “Stark? I should've found some of these things so far, shouldn't I?”

“I was kind of hoping.”

“Where are they?” Barton asked. “Why aren't the SHIELD sensors giving us a lock on them? On at least some of them?”

“I don't like any of the answers I could give you, so I'm not going to verbalize them,” Tony said.

“Oh, that's fucking comforting.” Clint turned the corner, and nearly took a Roomba to the face. He dodged, the move instinctive and intuitive, and the thing skimmed past his skull with inches to spare. Cursing and snarling, Clint rolled and scrambled after it, his feet skidding and slipping, unable to get purchase.

It took him precious seconds, but he got himself moving and moving fast enough to track the damn thing, skidding around a corner and coming to a stop at an open drop that echoed down into darkness that his lights couldn't break. “Barton,” Phil's voice snapped in his ear, “update. Now.”

“Got one. Moving fast, North-Northeast, dropping two floors,” Clint snapped, slamming an anchor into place. Uncoiling the line, he gave the line a yank to check the hold, and pushing himself over the edge into the main ventilation shaft. “Stark, you have a lock on my position?” he asked as he bounced his way down.

“Yes, moving fast and sliding down,” Tony said. “Got a visual on our boy?”

“Maybe.” Rappelling to a stop, Clint braced his foot against the metal frame and swung his body around into place. Leaning forward, eyes narrowed, he stared at the bent wire framework that had previously covered the entrance to the air shaft. That was a lot more damage than one Roomba could've done on its own. “I think I may have found their gathering point,” he said, pulling a multitool from a pocket on his thigh. A few minutes later, he yanked the grating free and released it to tumble down to the base of the shaft. 

It took a lot of time to reach the bottom.

“Yeah, that shaft goes right through the heart of the SHIELD building,” Tony said. “No fans and fairly wide. Good access.”

Clint swung himself in. “Yeah, pretty easy to move. And I've got something up ahead.” He reached up, adjusted the comm unit. “What the hell?”

The Roomba he'd been following was floating in the middle of the duct, swerving from side to side, bouncing off the sides of the walls and clattering against the ceiling. Another Roomba was blocking its forward movements, their metal frames clattering off of each other.

“What the- Stark, did you program these things to fight?”

“No. What the hell...”

“Yeah, that's what I was thinking,” Clint admitted. He pushed forward, and the Roomba he'd been following shot past the other one and streaked down the duct away from Clint.

And disappeared.

Clint blinked. “Okay,” he said, his voice drawing the word out. “Okay, that was weird. That was fuckin' weird.”

“Report, Barton,” Coulson snapped in his ear. 

“The thing just vanished in midair,” Clint said, and the other Roomba, the one that had been doing the blocking, sped forward and thumped against Clint's shoulder. He rocked back. “Hey, ow, cut it out.” He reached up and caught it with one hand.

“What do you mean it vanished?” Tony asked.

“It was there, and then it was gone. Vanished,” Clint said, struggling against the remaining one. “Down, stop it! Don't make me EMP your shiny metal ass.” He pushed it down to the floor, and blinked at his own printing, done in black Sharpie. “Huh, it's Mr. Fantastic. Why's he got a red cross painted on him now, Tony?”

“What? Oh, the special one I fixed. I made it a repair unit. Also probably the smartest of them, it was the last one I tinkered with. They didn't do a good job putting him together, so I was pushing the code a bit farther than the others. Is it back, then?”

“No. Mr. Fantastic was trying to stop the other one from going that way.” Clint shifted, his eyes narrowed in the lowered light, the depths revealed only by the lamps he carried. “Trying to block it. And now I think it's doing the same thing to me. It doesn't want me to go down this way.” He leaned a palm against the Roomba. 

“Stark?” Coulson snapped out. 

“I don't know,” Tony admitted. “They weren't programmed to do that, but this one might have the capability to make the call, it's designed as a last resort. Repair unit and smart enough to preserve itself, so that if the rest of the Roombas are damaged beyond the capability to recover, that one needs to be the last line of defense. So the others can be rebuilt.”

“So what does it know that we don't?”

“I don't know,” Tony snapped out. “Fuck it, I don't know. But I'd say, don't go down that way, Clint. Get out of there.”

“Are its sensors more adept then what SHIELD has monitoring the facility?” Clint asked, eyes still scanning the metal walls.

“Barton, get out of there. That's an order,” Coulson snapped out.

“Not even close,” Tony said.

“So why...” Clint leaned forward, and the exposed fingers of his right hand landed on the metal floor. He looked down. “Physical contact,” he said, his voice very soft. “It's not seeing or hearing. It's touching. SHIELD doesn't have anything TOUCHING the duct.”

“What are you talking about?” Tony asked.

“Barton!” Coulson snarled.

“Too late, sir. It's already got me.” Beneath his hand, he could feel the metal pulse, flexing and moving and slithering under his hand, and his skin crawled. “It's masquerading as the duct. Perfect camouflage. But I can feel it. There's something. Alive. Around me. It's already got me.”

“CLINT.”

Clint snagged the comm unit from his ear and twisted, flinging the comm with all the strength in his arm. It disappeared into the darkness behind him, and he grabbed hold of the Roomba.

As the comm unit tumbled down the main ventilation shaft, its owner was already gone.


	3. Chapter 3

It took fourteen minutes and seven seconds to clear the entirety of SHIELD headquarters.

Coulson was furious with that reaction time. 

Twenty minutes later, as he was chewing out another junior agent, the fifth or sixth in a row, when Fury collared him and pulled him away. “Enough,” he said, his voice a low growl. “We cleared the whole place without any further losses. Step back. We don't know what's happened yet.” His hand fell heavily on Coulson's shoulder, squeezing hard. “We're working on it, and we're going to keep working on it. But for now, I need you to go and corral the rest of the Initiative, because they are making everyone very, very nervous.”

Coulson sucked in a slow, deep breath, and then another. “I understand, sir,” he said, straightening his shoulders and trying not to scream that he didn't give a flying fuck if the rest of SHIELD felt nervous. At least the Avengers were doing something. 

It wasn't in any way helpful, but it was action.

Fury patted him on the shoulder, a rough slap of his hand, and it was supposed to be comforting, he knew it was, but it made Phil's hands curl into fists. “There's a car waiting for you. Go.”

Phil went.

SHIELD was securing the perimeter with ruthless efficiency, but for now, the Avengers, far too valuable to risk until the situation was more understood, had been exiled back to a nearby satellite station, a building kept in reserve as an emergency headquarters. 

It was not a good place to be right now. Thor and Steve were pacing, their paths working almost parallel to each other, never meeting, but never straying too far away. Natasha was perched in the window overlooking the street, and the SHIELD building beyond, her head turned away from the group, her thumb worrying some small item in her hand. Phil didn't have to be told to know that it was some trinket that Clint had given her at some point through the years, that she would deny having kept. Tony was huddled around a tablet PC, his head down, his shoulders hunched, his fingers moving through the information with brutal speed. He didn't respond to anyone or anything else, but was muttering in a sharp undertone. When he twisted in the chair, an earpiece caught the light, making it clear that it was Jarvis he was snarling at.

Only Banner was in his element, plowing through the information that the SHIELD scientists were routing to him, his forehead furrowed and his mouth tight. He was on the phone with Jane Foster, scientific concepts flying too fast for anyone else to follow them. Jane's voice, even over the speaker phone, seemed to calm Thor down, and he was no longer growling under his breath.

As Phil slipped past the door, every head turned in his direction. Tony glanced up, then quickly back down. Natasha met Phil's eyes, her own blank and cold, but her fingers were shaking, just a little, when she rested her hands back in her lap. “The building's clear,” Phil said, keeping his voice calm and even, no matter how much it hurt. “Everyone other than Barton is accounted for.”

“We must go back and look for him!” Thor burst out. He turned and brought a fist down on the table, making Bruce jump. Bruce took a deep breath, then another, his skin taking on a vague green cast. 

“Thor, honey,” Jane started, then sighed. “Bruce, could you take me off speaker and let me talk to Thor for a second?”

“Yeah, a break might be a good idea,” Bruce said, scooping up the cell and changing the settings before handing it to Thor. The huge blonde man slumped into a seat, his hand cradling the tiny device against his cheek. His tense face relaxed as Jane talked him down.

Bruce turned to Tony. “You want to take a look at this?” he asked, and Tony shook his head without looking up. Bruce's mouth tightened, but he just shook his head, not saying another word.

“It's not your fault,” Steve said to Tony.

“Actually, it is,” Phil said, because he was sick of pretending that everything was hunky-dory. “He should've come to you or me with his suspicions, even after Fury shot him down.”

Steve shook his head. “Clint's the one who decided to move without us knowing,” he pointed out, his voice gentle. “You know Clint better than any of us. When he wants to do something, he's going to do it. No matter what the rest of us think of it.” He paused, rubbed a hand over the back of his neck. “It's not Tony's fault.”

“Actually, there's not much doubt. It is my fault.” Tony flicked his tablet off. “I need to get some items from the tower,” he said, his tone offhand, and Phil wanted to punch him, wanted to haul off and nail the smug bastard for his complete lack of concern. It must've shown, somehow, on his face, because Natasha was suddenly there, between the two of them, acting as if she was just going to check on Bruce. But she tipped her head to the side and gave Phil a speaking glance. 

He couldn't lose it here, he couldn't expect them to understand, when he'd made the conscious decision not to tell anyone about his relationship with Clint. More than that, he'd hidden it from them, and Clint had gone along with it. He hadn't cared either way, or at least that's what he told Phil. 

But it suddenly occurred to Phil that keeping their relationship secret was better for him at work, and his work and his home life had somehow become a tangled mess, but it was so much worse now, now when he needed to be able to tell someone, anyone, that he could barely breathe. That he needed to think, needed to work through this, needed to do something, anything, and this was not a situation where going in guns blazing would serve any purpose whatsoever. 

That did not mean that Phil didn't want to shoot something in the goddamn face.

Barton had dropped off the grid before. Phil had been afraid, desperately afraid, more times than he could count, when an op had gone wrong, or the lines of communication had been cut, or he'd seen, seen from a distance, as Clint fell, from a high spot, or from a bullet to the chest, or from pure exhaustion.

And he wondered, on some level, if this time, it would've been easier, if the people around him, if Clint's team, his chosen team, had known just what Phil had lost. Maybe that was the problem with being a private person. You couldn't just ask everyone to keep their noses out of your business, and then turn around and expect them to know when you were bleeding out.

After all, as he'd told Clint so many times, sometimes no one would know you're dying if you don't open your mouth and ask them for help.

Tony pushed past Steve, muttering something about the SHIELD drones being absolutely pathetic, and needed his own tech for this, because no one knew what was happening, and Steve wanted him to stay, to keep what was left of his team in one place, but he was losing the fight, he always lost it, because Tony was more stubborn and Phil wondered if Clint would be okay with Phil telling them all when he got back.

Knowing Clint, his response would probably be to lean into the kitchen one morning and yell, “I'm fucking this guy, and it's fantastic!” and then drag Coulson back to bed. Which would be embarrassing, and infuriating and so like Clint.

Maybe he'd surprise him. Maybe Phil would try that.

“Coulson?” Bruce asked from the table, where he'd taken the phone back from Thor. Natasha had boosted herself up to sit on the edge of the table, and Thor had folded his arms in her lap and was now resting his head on them. Natasha was stroking his hair, a faint smile on her face. Steve was leaning against the window, lines of strain on his face as he watched for Tony through the glass panes.

Coulson paused behind him, patting him on the back. Steve glanced at him, and Phil managed a smile. “He'll find something to help us,” he said, with a strained smile back. Phil nodded, not sure he believed that, but he was willing to give Steve the benefit of the doubt.

And Steve was willing to give Tony the benefit of the doubt. Phil couldn't really blame him. 

"Yeah," he said to Bruce. "What've we got?"

*

“You know, certain things were NOT mentioned in SHIELD's recruiting spiel. I mean, I realize I got Coulson's patented 'join or I'll shoot you in the OTHER leg' speech, but really. Some things bear mentioning. And at no point, and I would've remembered this, at no point did anyone say, 'Join SHIELD. Be eaten by a monster leaving in our own headquarters and end up in some sort of freaky alternate dimension with fifty plus needy over emotional robotic vacuum cleaners!' Seriously, guys, chill out!”

The diatribe did nothing to stop the panicky movements of said fifty plus Roombas who had decided that Clint was the only port they had in this particular storm, and they were damn well going to stay within bumping distance. “Okay, I know, that's not going to fit on a recruiting poster, and you guys are terrifying, really, I'm glad that we're friends, we are friends, aren't we?” 

Mr. Fantastic landed on Clint's head, and Clint sighed. “Yeah, I know, you're my favorite, I promise, but if you start playing with my hair, I am going to use your for target practice. And there's a lot of fucking things in here to use for tiddly-winks, so let's not go down that path.”

And that was the fucking truth.

Clint had woken up with every inch of his body aching, a lump on the back of his head about the size of a baseball, and no clue where the hell he was. It was a fairly common occurrence in his life. However, he'd never woken up somewhere like, well, this.

It was a room, that was a plus. He wasn't in something's stomach, or worse, lower intestinal tract.. Big and square and ceiling and floor and walls, somewhere, he was sure that there were walls, but that was a guess on his part. As of yet, he hadn't found any, and he'd tried. The problem was twofold, one there was a limited light source, and two, there was a lot of junk between him and anything else that might've been there.

A lot of stuff. Like, Clint was glad that Phil had an unnatural attachment to reality tv, because he was pretty damn sure that he'd landed in an alien version of 'Hoarders.' He hadn't found any cameras, or anything he could recognize as a camera, but he also hadn't found anything that counted as another living being. Just him, the Roombas, and a huge pile of junk.

Maybe junk wasn't the right word. But it was hard to tell what he was looking at, when there was this much of it. There were stacks, piles, huge tangled amounts. There was light where ever he was, where ever there was movement, and even though he couldn't tell where it was coming from, at least he wasn't in the dark. If he'd known he was going to live, he wouldn't have tossed his comm, and with it, his light, but here, it hadn't been a problem. 

Attempting to figure out the dimensions of the room, he'd climbed to the top of a mound of tangled metal, feeling nothing so much like a mountain goat as he picked his way over the uneven surface, all his past experience at scaling to unstable sniper nests and highwire acts coming into play, and then he sent Roombas out in all directions. He watched as the lights, and he had no idea where the light was coming from, really, it just seemed to follow any and all movement, had disappeared in the distance.

Still had no idea how big the room was. Even his eyes, as good as they were, lost track of the moving roombas, and it took what seemed like a very long time for them to get back. He didn't know if they actually reached a wall, or if they just decided they weren't getting any further away from Clint. It was hard to tell.

Reluctant to move far from where he'd been dropped, in case anything else came through, Clint had started digging through the piles, looking for anything and everything that seemed the least bit familiar. Anything he thought he could use. Tablets, computers, watches, clocks, tools, light fixtures, flashlights, can openers, video game consoles, old radio tubes and teletype machines. He found a telegraph machine and an old astrolabe, a huge compass and what he thought might've been an old radar range style microwave from the 1970's, and about six blenders.

Even if he just stuck to what he could identify as human tech, there was a metric ton of stuff in here. As for the stuff that wasn't human tech, well, some of that stuff scared the crap out of him.

With the Roombas' help, he started moving things aside, buying himself a small amount of room on the floor where he could gather up as much as he could. A few of them, he realized, had been upgraded to the point where they could use vacuum suction to lift and carry small objects, flying them around to lay on the piles that Clint had laid out.

He handed off a betamax VCR, and pulled on what looked like a canvas top. Curious, he poked his head underneath. “Well, hello,” he said, grinning at the WWII era supply truck. Shoving trash and broken bits of items aside, he ducked inside. Crates of MREs and cannisters of water were laid out in neat rows. “If it doesn't poison me,” he said, pulling a box off the stack, “it just might keep me alive.”

“Well, good,” he said to Mr. Fantastic, hovering as always at his right shoulder, “I won't die of starvation or dehydration for a while. I'll have plenty of time to go completely fucking nuts as I stand here and talk to a vacuum cleaner.” Mr. Fantastic floated forward and bumped off of Clint's forehead.

“Yeah, thanks, buddy, I love you, too.” He opened his mouth to say something else when he heard a crack, like a sonic boom, outside the truck. Instinctively, he ducked, and came back up with Tony's new crossbow toy already at the ready. Outside, there was silence. He waited, patient as always, waited for any sound, any sign of life or movement, but there was nothing.

After about half an hour by his own estimation, he moved to the back of the truck and slipped out, peering around the edge of the truck, using it for cover as he moved his booted feet silently on the piles of metallic discards. In the middle of the area he'd cleared, a totem pole of a robot with a blinking red light on top and the words “StarkIndustries” on the side had appeared.

Keeping his weapon out, Clint crept closer. There was a bright orange Post-It note stuck to the front. In Tony's familiar writing, black marker slashing across the bright paper, it read, “Press the red button, dumbass.”

Rolling his eyes, Clint pressed the button. The light stopped blinking, and the thing made a sound reminiscant of a sigh. Nothing else seemed to happen. Mr. Fantastic swirled around the metallic form, then back to Clint's side. “I don't know,” Clint agreed. “At least they're looking. Wanna see what else we can find?”

Beeping a little, Mr. Fantastic headed off to Clint's right, a new direction for them. Clint glanced back, waiting for the robot stick thing to do something. It remained still and quiet, and he gave a faint sigh. “Fine,” he told it. “But I pressed your button. I did what I was told. You'd better come through here, Stark-Trash. Otherwise, I will be forced to lodge a formal complaint.”

He took off at a swift lope, keeping the pole-bot at his back. It was okay. They were looking for him. He could make himself useful for now.

*

Tony Stark had learned at a very early age that he could go just about anywhere he wanted to go, do anything he wanted to do, so long as he just acted confident. Act like he was supposed to be there, and act with enough force, and he'd get away with it.

He leaned against the wall, considering. Watching, waiting.

His phone vibrated in his pocket, and he pulled it out, checking the readout. He took a deep breath, and another one, convincing himself that this was a necessary thing. That this was something he needed to do. No matter how painful, how much it would haunt him later, he had to do this. For the good of the team. Because he did like Clint, and he'd miss the guy and his habit of having drunken philosophical discussions with Jarvis and the fact that he was the only one who could deflect Coulson at his most bureaucratic, and his chili was legendary, just fucking legendary.

He was doing this, Tony reminded himself, his fingers white-knuckled on his phone, for Clint. Because honestly, he was not going to be left on this fucking team with a bunch of actual super-humans and demigods and gamma irradiated monsters and NATASHA, fuck, no, he needed Clint, he needed Clint back right now, and this was so that he could get Clint back, he was doing this so that he could get his teammate back, safe and sound, and oh, God, he had to do this.

Tony set his shoulders, brought his chin up, and bit the bullet.

“Hello, Reed,” he said, and good for him, he actually sounded pleasant! Polite even! Wow, he was proud of himself. He was going to give himself a cookie when this was all over.

Actually, cookies sounded good.

“Hello, Tony, sorry, I just got your call.” Reed Richards sounded just as distracted as ever. “We were out of town, tracing down a really fascinating possibility for potential contact with-”

Tony tuned him out. He usually let Reed babble for about ten to fifteen minutes. He'd dealt with Pepper for enough years that he could comfortably make 'uh-huh' noises at the right point of a conversation while someone was babbling at him about things he did not care about. And my God, he did not care about whatever Reed was gibbering about.

So he did some general equations in his head, restructured the general joint design of the Mark V, and that kind of lead him naturally to Dummy's broken servo, the one that he always managed to throw off balance and it made Tony crazy, because he was trying to do things, trying to fix things, always trying to fix things, and then, boom, Dummy would keel over sideways, and that was a DISTRACTION.

“Tony?”

Tony snapped back into the here and now. “Yes, sorry, we're dealing with a, with a situation over here,” he said, staring at the notepad in his lap. “One of my teammates got eaten by, um, well, by an air conditioning duct.”

There was a beat of pause. “That's a new one,” Reed said, and he had that note, that annoying as all hell note of 'well, excellent, a puzzle for me to solve I'm so glad you called me, I look forward to making you feel like an idiot,' or maybe Tony was just projecting.

Tony took a deep breath and gave him the recap, quick and efficient. He paused at the end. “He's still alive. I need your help to get him back.”

Reed was silent for a moment. “There's a chance that he's not,” he said, and his voice was unexpectedly kind. Gentle, almost. 

“I'm going on the assumption that he is,” Tony said, and sighed. “One sec.” He pulled the phone away from his ear, cursing it mentally, and sent off the data. “Okay, back, this phone sucks, I cannot believe I'm dealing with three year old tech, I feel dirty. Take a look at that.”

He could hear Reed running through the data, long, unnaturally long hands and fingers dancing over multiple keyboards. “Fascinating,” he said at last. “I think I see what you're doing. But your sensors aren't powerful enough to-”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, let's not diss my sensor arrays, I have the largest privately owned satellite system on Earth, and that is the literal truth, it is by no means my fault that Clint managed to find himself in some other fucking dimension or some nonsense, he's always delighted in causing trouble.” Tony sucked in a breath. “Can you trace that signal?”

“Trace it? Tony, you're making a vast leap from actual verifiable data here, you're making assumptions on a level that is just not scientifically-”

“He's alive, and twenty seven minutes ago, he did what I told him to do and replaced the central processing unit of one of the Roombas, which caused it to drop from the network hive mind that Jarvis maintains,” Tony snapped. “Jarvis can't talk to them and can't control them and can't trace them, but when my AI says that it was connected, and then the connection was cut, then I believe him, because he doesn't make mistakes with tracking things that are his responsibility.”

“Unlike us, Tony?” Reed said, and Tony winced.

“It doesn't matter if we lose them, Reed, as long as we get them back.” He pushed a hard hand through his hair, and took a deep breath.

“Intuitive leap,” Reed said.

“You're already tracking it, aren't you?”

He made a humming, non-commital noise. “I'm doing my best, Tony.”

“That's all I ask-” The phone buzzed in his ear, and he cursed. “Sorry, Reed, looks like Steve's looking to talk to me about this, you all right with me putting this on three way?”

“Go ahead, he should know what you're planning on doing, because this, Stark? This is stupid.”

“All of my best ideas are, buddy.” Tony flicked over to Steve. “Hello, Cap, Reed Richards and I were talking about the situation, got you on three-way, anything new to add?”

“Reed?” Steve was thrown for a moment, Tony could almost see the words get derailed before he pulled himself together. 

“Hello, Steve, give me a second, Tony's got me running some data.” He paused. “How many drones have you lost, Tony?”

“Four. Then I ran out of prototypes.”

“You trying to lose the ones that weren't finished, or weren't up to snuff?”

“No. It won't take the same model twice.”

Both men were silent. “What's going on, Tony?” Steve finally asked. “Where are you?”

“Working theory,” Tony said, his fingers beating a nervous tattoo on the case next to him. “Pretty sure I'm right. Odds are in my favor, but-” He broke off. “Fury's working on the assumption that this thing just found its way into the vents. I don't think that's correct. If it had been here for any length of time, and had any interest in people, we would've had a list of missing SHIELD agents as long as my arm, we can't see it, can't track it, can't stop it, SHIELD headquarters would be an all you can eat buffet, and that's not what we've got. Clint's the first one that's gone missing.”

He bent over his notepad, having not trusted a tablet. “Two weeks ago, there was a repair crew in the ventilation system changing out the air filters. None of them reported any problems, or any missing crew members. Only one oddity; one group had a toolbox go missing. The whole thing. Internal theft was assumed, because, hey, did you know that that's actually currently a problem for SHIELD?

“No, you didn't, because it's been an internal issue. But get into those files, and you'll find a seven month pattern of things going missing. Small things, mostly. Nothing sensitive, no data, no classified shit, just personal phones and PDAs, tablets, laptops. A Leatherman multitool. A titanium spork, which actually sounds pretty awesome and I have already ordered myself one, because why the fuck not.” He ran his pen down the column of items. “A sewing machine, of all goddamn things, that someone had stowed under his desk after picking it up from a repair shop. Weird. But it was assumed that someone had light fingers, and the HR department was handling it. Low priority, really, but the files were being collected.”

Tony paused. “Tie that back to what was happening seven months ago. Steve, do you remember what we were doing seven months ago? And no, I'm not talking about the toxic butterflies that Doom made, really, Richards, I swear you wait until you know he's going to do something that'll make us look fucking STUPID and then you're conveniently out of town, leaving us to deal with it.”

The Hulk had been surprisingly efficient with a butterfly net, but Richards didn't need to know that.

“The Skrull ship,” Steve said.

“The Skrull ship,” Tony agreed. “SHIELD found a half-destroyed Skrull ship and dragged it home,” he explained to Reed.

“That was stupid,” Reed said.

“I tried telling them that. I tried telling them that it was the beginning of every bad SyFy original movie ever, and I should know because Clint loves things like 'Sharktapus Vs. Megaduck,' and so we have seen them all, some of them twice.”

“Clint's not the only one who likes those things,” Steve pointed out.

“Yes, but you don't know how bad the special effects are,” Tony said, deflecting neatly away from the fact that yes, he loved the stupid things, because they were stupid, and because he could do better effects with Jarvis and an AutoCAD program. “In any case, seven months ago, Fury insisted that the damn thing had been scanned six ways to Sunday and brought it back to live in the lowest labs. We know this. We know that the ship came, and then six hours after it was unloaded, one of the lab techs claimed that her iPhone went missing. Seven months of petty theft later... Clint disappears. The one and only living thing to go missing. That's fact. That's what we know. Here's the supposition.

“There was something on board that ship that snags tech. Maybe it's for espionage, maybe it's as a physical backup, but it grabs things that it's never encountered before and makes them go bye-bye. Now, the logical thing about that is that it's delivering this tech, there's no reason to damage it or destroy it, so where ever he ended up, he's probably pissed off, but safe.

“This thing's been active, and tasting human tech, but probably not for the first time. It's only fairly recent stuff that's gone missing, or weird stuff. Like the spork. Or the Roombas.”

He paused, scribbling another line on his notepad. “The Roombas. They probably got bored in the R&D department, and pushed their way out. Once they were out, they followed the concentration of dirt through the building, heading for the management offices because the higher security the area, the more rarely it's cleaned. The lobby is mopped and swept and waxed every day, but Fury's office? Not going to have a random dude with a floor buffer wandering around in there.

“But they met resistance, and one of them peeled off, probably found an access to the vents and headed through there, cleaning as it went. When it got snagged, the reaction of 'Oh, Tiny Robot Jesus, I've found something I can't handle alone, I need backup,' must've gone through the ranks, and all of them, in groups, headed for the last known coordinates. Only Mr.-” Tony froze, and backpedaled. “Only Clint's special one recognized that where ever they were going, they were no longer HERE and so probably they should stop going there. Because it was ending badly.

“But to our friendly neighborhood tech eater, they must've been like potato chips, can't eat just one. Each just different enough to be interesting, and so tasty, and they were basically loading themselves into the hopper. Might as well swallow 'em.”

Tony rubbed a hand down his face. “So Clint would've been fine, if not for two things. One, he was wearing a piece of utterly unique tech on his right wrist, a prototype, one of a kind, and second, he snagged the Roomba right before he disappeared. He got swallowed accidentally, like a whale scooping up a plastic bottle along with it's diet of krill. Not what it wanted, but he got caught in the net.”

“Supposition,” Reed said.

“The numbers are in my favor.”

“How do you know he reached for the Roomba?” Steve asked.

“I got his headset back, reviewed the footage.”

“One of the drones made it back out?” Steve asked, and there was a strained note to his voice now.

Tony paused. “No.”

A long silence. “Tony, where are you?”

Tony stared at the metal wall. “Sitting about five feet from where Clint was taken. In the ventilation system.”

“You're an idiot,” Reed said, and Tony grinned.

“Calculated risk. It doesn't want me. Not an uncommon occurrence, but I've been sitting here for about forty minutes, I can feel what he felt, the metal flexing and shifting, there's a super creepy element to that, by the way, the urge to scream is hard to force down, but getting easier, but I'm still here.” He'd left his phone, his tablet, his watch, everything even remotely technological, behind. He'd picked an older phone model that was on the list of the ones already stolen, and a general SHIELD issue flashlight. “It was a calculated risk,” he repeated. “Because if hadn't been Clint, eventually, it would've taken me.” His fingers tapped a nervous tattoo on the arc reactor. “After all, I've got the rarest piece of tech around these parts, and I kind of need it.” He flattened his palm against it. “Put an old arc reactor on one of the drones we sent in. Non-functional, but the same design as the one I'm wearing, just missing the core. It worked, which was awesome, I was a little nervous about that when I first walked in, I'll admit it.” 

“Get out of there.” Steve's voice had that still, flat note that he only got in the field, when he was giving orders that he expected to be obeyed. Immediately, and without question. “That's an order, Stark, now, you get out of there RIGHT NOW.”

“I can't,” Tony said, with a faint smile. “Reed's got the data. But he needs someone on the other side. My suit's got a dimensional tracker in it, with that, we'll be able to trace this to it's end point, and if he's watching when it takes me, he'll know how to find it and get it the hell out of SHIELD.”

“Stark, get out of there.” 

“Tony, we have time, don't do anything stupider than you've already done. I can figure this out, you need to get the suit, anyway.”

“Actually, Richards, if I leave to get the suit, they're not going to let me come back in, so, yeah, we won't be doing that.” Tony patted his case. “Luckily, the briefcase suit is built to be utterly impervious to all known types of scanning. Right now, it just looks like a metal block. Soon as I activate it, though, I'd say you'll have less than thirty seconds to lock onto me before it, well, swallows, for the lack of a better word. Are you ready?”

“Not in the least, Tony, do not-”

Tony could hear Steve running, and knew he was going to be slowed down, but not stopped, by the SHIELD agents set at the building parameter. “Don't do this, Tony, we'll get him back, we'll get him back in a way that does not require you throwing yourself off the cliff after him, do not do this.”

“I've run the numbers. The best chance we have at succeeding is to have the me on the other side, working with Reed, who, after all, the best person to figure out where in the multiverse we've landed.” He ripped off the page with all of his calculation, folding it in half. “It's kinda my fault here, Steve. The Roombas are my fault, the nanotech crossbow on his wrist is my fault, it's all...” His fingers moved, precise and swift. “I can't really do much to make up for my mistakes, but I can fix them. Or go down swinging.” He finished, and held the paper airplane up at shoulder level. With a flick of his wrist, he sent it floating down the vent to disappear into the darkness. “You'll find my calculations at the bottom of the air shaft. Reed, you ready?”

“No.”

“Lying,” Tony said, grinning, manic and sharp and horrible. “C'mon, get it together Richards. Ready?”

“No, I'm not, do not do this!”

“Steve, we'll be back before you know it, do not let SHIELD declare either of us dead, okay, the paperwork is just horrific to get it undone, Pepper nearly killed me herself last time so she wouldn't have to do it.” He flipped the case around. “Reed. Five, four, three-”

“No!” Steve was furious and freaked out and this was possibly the worst thing that Tony had ever done, and he knew it and he kept his eyes open the whole time he did it, anyway.

“Two, one, now.” He jammed his fists into the case, and even as it activated, as it started unfurling, he felt the duct beneath him heave, and twist and then he was in freefall, which was fine, which was great, because he could straighten his body out so that the suit could fold into place around him and he was still falling, and he didn't know how far, or how long, but when he hit it was with a massive crash.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Everyone will be fine, promise, but I couldn't fit it all in, so boom, one more chapter before this is done. Sorry, guys, I shouldn't try to do plot. 8)


	4. Chapter 4

Fury was going to kill a junior agent or six. There was no question in anyone's mind, he was going to kill them with just the pure force of his rage.

“Does anyone want to tell me how, exactly, Stark got back in the building? The building that was quarantined, with a secure perimeter? Anyone?”

“He walked,” Steve said, his voice calm and quiet. “Sir, we all know that when he's determined to do something, he's going to do it.” He was leaning up against the wall, arms folded across his chest. He was exhausted, nerves strained. He couldn't stop replaying his final conversation with Tony, over and over and over. It didn't change anything, and it only made him feel worse.

And he still couldn't stop.

Fury gave a snort of displeasure. “Natasha, find out which dumbasses let him in, and give them a severe re-education.”

Natasha nodded, her body swaying as she set off. Steve gave her a stern look as she passed, and she patted his arm with light fingertips. “Don't worry,” she said in an undertone. “They'll live.”

Steve gave her a grateful smile, and she chuckled. Fury gave them all a look, but before he could start in again, Hill hijacked his attention. Steve was rather relieved about that, as well.

Not that anyone else was paying any attention to the director. Bruce was on about a twelve way conference call with Reed Richards, Jane Foster, Hank Pym, and a bunch of people that Steve didn't know, and the scientific jargon was flying fast and hard. Steve understood some nouns and the occasional proposition, but that was about all. Thor had disappeared, supposedly to do recon, but everyone knew that he was attempting to get in touch with his crazed brother, to see if his magic might undo this tangle. It was a slim chance, but it made Thor feel better to have tried.

And to have given Loki yet another chance to redeem himself.

At the far end of the table, on his own, Phil was hunched over a stack of paperwork, dealing with the junior agents the scurried up, carrying information and bad news and requisition forms and requests from various government agencies as to what the heck was happening at SHIELD headquarters. Coulson dealt with all of it without so much as changing expression, but there were tight lines around his mouth, between his eyebrows.

Someone had left a paper tray of steaming coffee cups on the table, and Steve glanced at them before he picked two up and headed over to Coulson's side. He leaned over, offering Coulson the cup. “This one has your name on it,” he said, when the agent glanced up. “Literally.” Coulson took it with a faint smile.

“Thank you.” He nodded at the seat next to him, and Steve took it, knowing it was a peace offering. Coulson took a sip from his cup and then set it aside. “I'm sorry.”

Steve looked up from his own drink. “For what?”

“For blaming Stark for the situation,” Coulson said, going back to his paperwork. “He wouldn't have-” 

“Yes, he would've.” Steve shook his head. “He's quicker to blame himself than anyone else. He went in there with the da-” He swallowed. “With the dang suitcase suit. He planned this all along. Nothing either of us could've said could've stopped him.” And he did not want to think about how much that hurt.

“It didn't help, though,” Coulson said, a sharp twist to his words. “I lost my temper.”

“You lost an agent, that's enough to make anyone's nerves short. Natasha said that you were Clint's handler for a couple of years before the Avengers,” Steve said, folding his hands around his coffee cup. The heat was comforting, even if his nerves were already a jangled mess. It wasn't like caffeine affected him, any more than alcohol did, but he liked the scent, and the warmth, and the sense of community that came with the drink. 

“Yes,” Coulson said, head bent over his paperwork. His shoulders were a straight, tight line beneath his suit jacket. “Almost three years, before the Initiative was put into place.” His pen moved in quick, controlled strokes, precise, no flourishes or excess energy. “Most specialists and agents worked with a variety of handlers, but for the most part, Clint was only assigned to me.”

Steve's lips quirked. “He can be a bit difficult to anticipate in the field.”

“It never seemed to bother you,” Coulson said, sparing Steve a glance.

Steve shrugged. “My first real command experience was with the Howling Commandos, Coulson. That's not a name that you give to a bunch of guys who are good at standing around, waiting for orders and obeying military protocol. That's the name you give to a bunch of guys who you trust to know what to do, and how to get the job done, no matter how unconventional their tactics.” He gave Coulson a lopsided smile. “It's not that they couldn't follow orders. It's that I knew when they didn't need to. If that makes sense.”

Coulson's pen was hovering over the page. “It does, yes.” He glanced up at Steve. “It's still a hard thing for a commander to do, to relinquish control.”

“It's a trust issue,” Steve mused. “I mean, I guess. I had to trust them to know that if they were doing something insane, it was because it was the best option they saw. And they had to trust me when I pulled on the leash, and said, no, this time, I'm calling the shots. If either side didn't trust the other, it would've ended badly, so you find a place where everyone can do their job, and everyone can feel like they're trusted, and-” He paused, shook his head with a sigh. “And the job gets done.”

Coulson rotated his pen between his fingers, back and forth, a nervous tic of movement that Steve had never seen before. “Clint and Natasha could've been a disaster, as part of the Initiative,” he said, his voice low. “I'm the one who pushed for it.”

Steve blinked. “I didn't know that,” he said, and he hadn't.

Coulson leaned back in his chair. “From both a usage standpoint, and a PR standpoint, they were a natural fit. Their abilities were so far beyond the rest of SHIELD's agents. They were capable of more. Both from a physical and a personal standpoint. Also, let's be honest, it makes the general population a bit nervous when a team like this is made up of super humans. It's an instinctive fear thing. Adding some humans to the roster, ordinary people with extraordinary abilities and training, it smooths ruffled feathers. Keeps people calm. It's not an us or them situation, Natasha and Clint were the stand-ins for the American people on this team. It's a psychological thing, makes the Initiative easier to accept.”

“I... Never thought of that,” Steve said, slumping in his chair. The coffee cup was shaking in his hands, and he set it down on the table. “I never...” He let his head fall forward, rubbed a palm on the back of his neck. “I'm not used to thinking of myself as a 'them,' I guess.”

Coulson sighed. “It's a trust issue,” he said, his voice unexpectedly kind. “You're a hero, because of who you are, Captain, but there has always been an instinctive fear of the different. Having Black Widow and Hawkeye there makes it easier. But the whole thing hinged on you. You and Thor and Stark and Banner allowing them to do their jobs.” He looked up, clear, intelligent eyes meeting Steve's head on without flinching. “I had faith in you,” he said, with a faint smile. “I put my agents in your hands, and prayed I was doing the right thing.”

Steve stared at him. “Thank you,” he said at last, and he meant it. 

“No, thank you.” Coulson looked down at his pen, and he seemed to come to a decision. His indrawn breath was audible. “I was assigned to be his handler about four years ago,” he said, eyes meeting Steve's again. “We started sleeping together about two years ago.”

Steve felt his mouth drop open. “Oh,” he said. And again, “Oh,” because, yes. That was the piece of the puzzle that he'd been missing, and it made sense, now that he knew, now that he could understand, understand the way the two of them moved around each other, in each others space, as if they were hyper-aware of where the other one was at all times, the way that Coulson could predict when Clint wasn't where he was supposed to be in the field, and the way that Clint would volunteer his condition over the comms if something bad went down. The way that it was always Coulson who marched Clint into medical when he got hurt and the way that Clint was the only one who could get Coulson to movie night when the paperwork was piling up. The way that Clint had been unbearable, snappish and nasty and just horrible to live with when Coulson was sent off on a SHIELD assignment that didn't involve the Avengers and how Coulson got cold and quiet and sharp when Clint was off on recon or assigned to another SHIELD group. The way that Steve sometimes found them in the kitchen after an early morning run, just the two of them and the NYT crossword puzzle, Coulson calling out clues while Clint made omelets and came up with answers that even Steve knew were wrong. The way that Coulson would smack Clint on the back of the head when he was being obnoxious, and the way that Clint grinned in a way that only came out when he got that reaction.

The way that Coulson seemed brittle and fragile and over armored, all at once right now. Right now, as he looked at Steve, chin up, shoulders back, eyes steady. “I hope this won't make things difficult for you, but I felt you should know. The circumstances being what they are.”

And, heck, yes, 'oh' could be taken as a bad reaction, that was a bad reaction, because this was just something very personal and very private and Coulson was clearly thinking that Steve was going to have a problem with this, because, yeah, this wasn't something anyone talked about when he was younger. And he really didn't know what to say here, what was he supposed to say?

Steve took a deep breath. “I'm glad,” he said, because he was. Because that was true. “Um, that he's got you. He clearly-” Steve could feel his cheeks heat. “I always knew that you were his favorite. He's much, um, happier when you're around. Much more himself, less defensive. I'm glad you've got him, too. And-” He ducked his head. “I'm glad you told me. I won't say anything to anyone, I promise, but-” He looked back up and smiled, feeling like he'd passed some test, gotten past something with Coulson. “Thank you. For trusting me enough to tell me.”

Coulson's surprise was telegraphed in a single blink. A flicker of movement, uncontrolled and unexpected, and then his lips quirked up. “Thank you,” he said at last. “For understanding.”

“We'll get him back,” Steve said, because this must be an agony. He glanced across the room. “We have the finest scientific minds in the world working on it. And, well, Thor.”

That startled a laugh out of Coulson. “I know we will,” he said. “Thank you, Cap. Thanks for, well-” And there was a hint of red to his cheeks. “I didn't want to make you uncomfortable.”

Steve gave him a look. “Why does everyone think that no one was having sex in the forties?” he said, knowing he sounded forlorn, but unable to do anything about it. Okay, so, HE wasn't having sex, but that didn't mean that he didn't know what sex was, and, well, war made strange bedfellows sometimes, it wasn't anything that bothered him much. As long as everyone was consenting and happy, well, it didn't seem like it was any of his business. “Um, if I can just? Think about telling the rest of the team, okay? I mean, no pressure, but... It's easier to make sure that we stay off of each others' sore spots if we know where they are.”

Coulson nodded. “You were the one I was concerned about,” he said, in his usual, deadpan manner, and Steve flinched.

“I hope I haven't done anything to make you think-” he started, and Coulson cut him off.

“No. You haven't. But just because you seem to have adapted to the 21st century with such ease, it's unfair to assume that you're not getting a lot of things thrown at your head for which you have no frame of reference.”

“Tony helps with a lot of it,” Steve said, and he felt his face heat. “Well, Tony and Jarvis.” And there was no real reason for him to bring up the fact that he had, in fact, had Jarvis assist him with learning about a lot of equal rights struggles through the years. Not that he had any reason to look up gay rights, specifically. And if his brain did not stop thinking about Tony right now, he was going to have to go stick his head in the nearest sink until he could get his stupid blush under control.

“You can always ask me, as well. If there's anything you don't want to discuss with your teammates,” Coulson was saying, and Steve reached for his now cold cup of coffee.

“Coulson, if there was something I couldn't discuss with my teammates, why would I be able to discuss it with you?” he asked. “After all, you're one of my teammates, too.” He stood, and clapped a broad hand on Coulson's shoulder, squeezing as lightly as he could so as not to wrinkle Coulson's suit. “Don't worry. We'll get them both back.”

Coulson's hand covered his, just for a second, and he squeezed back. “I know we will.”

*

Tony just lay there, stunned, for a moment, or maybe a few moments. “Jarvis?” he called, and wasn't surprised when his AI didn't respond. It was a little traumatizing, however, he hated it when the voice went silent. He'd gotten so accustomed to it, back when Jarvis and the bots had really been his only, well, company for days on end, that when Jarvis ceased to reply to him, he had to choke back an urge to panic like a little kid.

Nice to know that he really hadn't ever grown up.

The HUD responded, snapping into place, and Tony did a quick scan of his surroundings. Thankfully, the atmosphere was breathable, no toxins or poisons that he could detect, no issues with temperature and the scanner was only picking up one life sign, human, and it was probably Barton, because said life sign was currently leaning over Tony, poking him in the face with a shiny stick.

With a sigh, Tony flipped up the visor. 

Clint stared down at him. He was wearing what appeared to be a massive, lopsided and jewel-encrusted crown, holding a scepter and surrounded by a floating mass of Roombas. “Welcome to the sovereign nation of Bartonia,” he said, with a straight face. “My subjects, the Roombas, the drones and one random mechanical bird thing that I found, and I welcome you, and ask you what the fuck you think you're doing here, you are seriously a fucking moron.”

“I'm here,” Tony gritted out, “to rescue you, and what kind of fucking attitude is that?.”

“A little short for a storm trooper, aren't you?” Clint said, arching an eyebrow. He offered Tony a hand. 

“Are you wearing a crown? Seriously? Where did you get a- Why are you wearing a crown?” Tony asked, taking it and allowing Clint to help lever him back to his feet. 

“Listen, dude, I have learned something about myself today. Mostly, I have learned that if I end up in some sort of alien rubbish dump surrounded by neurotic robots and without a clue as to if I'm ever going to make it home, if I find a crown, I'm putting that bad boy on. There should never be a time when you do not wear a crown. Find a crown, you wear it and declare sovereignty over the vast mechanical wastes.” Clint waved his scepter around a bit, making the Roombas dodge. “Thus, Bartonia.”

Tony looked around for the first time and the blood promptly drained out of his head. “Are we...” he choked out, dizzy with it. “Hummmmina,” Tony managed, because, heeeeeeeello, tech boner.

“Sitting in a gigantic, almost unending room filled with stolen technology? Why, yes, yes we are. You're having a heart attack aren't you? I'm going to assume that's your heart attack face, because if that's your 'this is my new fetish' face, I have to live with that knowledge.”

“I would kiss you right now, if not for the fact that I would deeply regret it later.”

“Try it and die. You have cooties.” Clint took a seat on what appeared to be a flying tank. Its flying days were currently over, but Tony was pretty sure he could fix that. “I have it from a good source.”

“Pepper only tells people that so that she doesn't have to pay sexual harassment lawsuits,” Tony explained, not really paying attention. So many pretty shinys. He had to seriously resist the urge to just do a belly flop into the nearest pile and roll around in them. “I've been cootie-free for at least a decade.”

“Seriously, you make your ex-girlfriend deal with your corporate sexual harassment lawsuits? You might be the worst ex ever, and I know from a crazy ex. Talk about the Facebook status of 'it's complicated.'” Clint reached up and caught one of the Roombas as it flew by. It lifted him up for a second, and he swung his legs in mid-air before it allowed itself to be dragged back down.

“I never actually get sued. I'm surprisingly charismatic. And Pepper is unsurprisingly terrifying.” Tony flipped his visor down and took off, floating above the ground. The room seemed like it was never ending, and it was packed to the gills with stuff. All sorts of amazing stuff. Tony made a whimpering noise. “Holy fuck, I am never leaving this place.”

“Just to be clear, I am not looking forward to dying alone of thirst after I kill and eat you, Stark, so tell me that you had a plan before you ended up here.”

“There's a plan, it's an excellent plan, Jesus, what'd you think, that I didn't have a plan? I always have a plan, and often times, those plans actually work, it's not like we were just going to leave you.” Tony said. He did some quick scans, and realized that there was only silence. He looked down at Clint, who was staring at the Roomba on his lap, calloused fingers rubbing over the casing. 

“Wow. You don't think much of us, do you?” Tony asked, as he dropped himself down to the ground. “I mean, I don't blame you, we're pretty dysfunctional and all, but really. We've crossed dimensional borders to bring back Doom, and I hate that guy. We like you, and besides, it's your night to cook, screw you, if you think you're going to get out of that just because you were dumb enough to get eaten by the SHIELD ventilation system.” Tony smirked at him. “I am never letting you live that down, by the way.”

“I figured you thought I was dead.” Clint shrugged, resigned to that. “Hell, I thought I was dead until I woke up. It was one of those, 'son of a bitch' moments.”

“Yeah, I know that one,” Tony said, grinning. “Like, 'fuck, yes, I'm not dead, wait, oh, fuck, what do I do now?'” He shrugged. “Common occurrence. Sometimes, the relief at being not dead is tempered by the fact that being dead would sure be a hell of a lot easier.”

“That shouldn't be a common occurrence, Stark. Really. How the hell did you end up here, anyway?”

“Put on the Iron Man suit, which is the tech equivalent of wrapping myself in tasty, tasty bacon, and sat in the vent until it ate me,” Tony said. “It took about a minute.”

“Wait, you deliberately-” Clint stared at him. “That is a fucking stupid plan.”

Tony shrugged. “We can't all let Coulson come rescue us. He has other things to do.” Tony dodged when Clint swung a half-serious fist at the side of his head. “Wow, punching a guy in armor when you're not Thor: now that's pretty stupid.”

“Yeah, well, I've never been smart.” Clint gave him a wry smile. “I wasn't hired for my smart. I was hired for my ability to shoot things until they were dead.”

Tony picked up something that looked like an amazingly detailed clock, running gauntlet covered fingers over the planes of it. “Being smart's supposed to be my job,” he said, with a shrug. “And to get you back, I had to call Reed Richards. Talk about swallowing my pride. With a serious dose of arsenic as a chaser.”

“Aw, man, you called Richards? We're never going to hear the end of it,” Clint groused. “Jesus, Stark, he's going to lord that over me every time we see each other for like the next year. I will shoot him if he brings this up in the middle of a fight.” 

“Yeah, I had to promise myself cookies.” Tony reached for something that might've been a high tech Rubik's cube, or it might've been a bomb. He set to work on it. “We are going for fucking cookies when we get back. Like, the good kind, the ones from that French bakery, you know, the um, the one that makes those weird little almond cookies with the fillings, in all the different colors?”

“I like those,” Clint said, kicking his legs out in front of him.

“Yeah, Pepper always buys the weird ones. Which is good, because if it were up to me, it'd just be giant bag of chocolate and hazelnut and say fuck it to anything that's pink, and the pink ones are usually really good.” He glanced over as the Roomba pulled out of his hands and hovered up to land on Clint's head, balancing precariously on the crown. “Got a friend?”

“Yeah.” He paused. “Tony?”

“Yeah?”

“Can I keep this one?”

Tony glanced up at the Roomba, which was making happy noises as it spun itself in circles. He looked back at the child's toy slash nuclear warhead in his hand. “Clint, I replaced the case, silkscreened a red cross emblem on it, and repainted it, and you'll notice it still has your sucky handwriting on it designating it Mr. Fantastic.” His lips twitched up. “And let's face it, he likes you best. If he wants to stay with you, and it appears that he does, who the hell am I to try telling him differently?”

Clint blinked. “Oh. Okay.” He reached up and the Roomba moved to brush against his fingertips. “Thanks.”

“Yeah.” Tony got the thing open and peered inside. “Oh. Well, that answers that.” He snapped it shut again and reached out to put it carefully on the ground. “Moving on.”

“What answers what?”

“Never mind. Don't... Don't touch that, okay? Pretend that doesn't exist.” Tony stood. “Richards got a lock on me and the tracker in my suit before I disappeared, I'm sure of it. So it's just a matter of finding a way to control the portal the thing makes, and they can do it.”

“In that case, why didn't you just send the damn suit without you in it?” Clint asked, standing as well. He brushed his hands off on his thighs.

“Because I'll be damned if I let the suit fall into someone else's hands. It doesn't work out well for me. Ever.” 

“Better than dying, dumbass.”

“I don't agree.” Tony stretched. “Let's go see what we can find. Oh, and Hawkeye?” He waited until Clint was looking at him. “I'd like to point out I've got a long family history of wasting time and money looking for a lost comrade. My father must've spent millions looking for Steve, and I refuse to let the dead bastard win.” He gave a shrug. “Nothing to do with you, so don't get a big head.”

Clint stared at him, one eyebrow arched. “Are you trying to do some sort of emotional thing here? Because I am not A. drunk enough or B. nearly close enough to dying to allow that.”

“Of course it's not. You're wearing a fucking crown right now, there is no way to have a serious discussion with a man wearing a crown and a Roomba, it's, no, it's just too ridiculous.”

“Good.”

“Good,” Tony agreed. “Let's get to work.”

“What, exactly, are we doing?” Clint rolled to his feet.

“Finding out how we got here, and how we're getting out.”

Clint pointed up. “Things appear up there, fall down, go boom. Not hard.”

“Yeah, but where are they coming from?”

Clint shrugged. “All over. Look at the piles. This stuff, where we both started out, is almost all human in origin. The farther away you get, the more foreign stuff is mixed in. So I think our drop point is fixed. Except there's multiple human points of origin.”

Tony flipped his visor down and took off, hovering over the landscape. Running some quick scans, he said, “All this stuff implies that there was an intelligence, a person or people who set this up.”

“If that's the case, they haven't been back in a while.” Clint grabbed a quick boost from Mr. Fantastic and let the Roomba lift him to the top of a pile. “Look at this stuff. No one's been clearing this out, Tony. Either they're dead, or they've lost interest.”

“The former's more likely. But if there was an intelligence at work here, there must be some way to control this. They would've had some way to keep things under control.” Tony glanced at Clint. “You okay if I do a quick run around, see if I can find the perimeter?”

“Go for it. I'll wait here and baby-sit the Roombas. Just as a warning, though, we went looking for the walls, and never managed to find them.” He took a seat. “Tony? Do not get distracted by something shiny and forget to come back.”

“Says the guy in the crown. I'll be back in ten minutes, whether I find anything or not.”

“Cool. I'm just going to dig around in this pile of, I don't know, the late nineties, I guess?”

Chuckling, Tony shot off, scanning as he went. The room was larger than he'd thought, but not unmanageable, a couple of hundred yards from where he'd started, he found a wall. Blank and metal and smooth as silk, it didn't tell him much, but at least he'd found it. Just about to turn back, he heard a crack, and turned his head in time to see something come tumbling down.

By the time he got back, Clint and the Roombas had made the trip to the new arrival. “What've we got?” Tony asked, coming in for a landing and flipping his visor back. 

“Somewhere out there, there is a sobbing artist, because they just lost an exceptionally nice desk with a light box embedded in it,” Clint said. “Find anything?”

“A wall. And-” Tony paused, flipped the visor back down and went through his readings. “Bingo. I think I got a lock on the point of origin for our little portals. That's the good news.”

“And what's the bad news?”

Tony tipped his head back. “Well, there appear to be hundreds of them. And I don't know which one we came out of. Do you?” He blinked as the computer display pinpointed dozens of points where the energy signatures were waiting to spew out more stuff.

“I can't even see them.” Clint followed his gaze anyway. “Can we use one to get back?”

“I think I can make something that would push them open, but without knowing which one we came out of, God only knows where we'll end up.”

“Like the doors in 'Monsters, Inc'?”

“Do you watch anything other than extreme violence and cartoons?”

“Why bother?”

“Good point.” Tony paused. “If I could get these open, or at least cracked, can you get something through them?”

“Yes.” Clint grinned. “I think I found just the thing. You get to work on yours, and I'll get to work on mine. Let's go, I wanna go home.”

*

“Well, that's quite something,” Bruce said, leaning over the 3d map projection of SHIELD headquarters that Jarvis had helped Richards put together. There was a wide swath of red throughout the core of it. “You think all of that is our little guest?”

“It's almost certain. The readings from when Tony disappeared were enlightening, to say the least. I think it's moveable, it's certainly not forced to stay where it is, but for whatever reason, it may be more comfortable surrounded by metal, so the ducts are a natural place for it to retreat. But if Tony's right about the thefts, and there's no reason to think that he's wrong at this point, it can move around, as it wishes to.”

“Is it alive?” Coulson asked, arms folded over his chest.

“Doubtful. It seems to be a limited intelligence AI. I could be mistaken, but there's nothing that matches any known life form we've ever encountered.” He leaned over. “Jarvis, can you please show the potential course of movement that we think it's followed?”

“Of course.” There was a flicker, and then the red patch re-solidified on one of the lower levels. 

“It moved up through the building, following the vents. There's whole swaths of the building it never got close to. And if you follow the path, it managed to avoid most of the sensitive laboratories and the workshops, which explains why nothing SHIELD would be worried about went missing. The air systems in the sensitive areas are much more complex, to prevent accidental cross-contamination, in both directions.” Reed leaned forward. “So it moved through the building, likely in this pattern-” The red patch moved, marking points where thefts had been reported with flashing dots. “Ending up here.”

“Which would also explain why we didn't lose Tony earlier,” Bruce said. “He's unlikely to have crossed paths with it at any point. He would keep to these areas.” He leaned forward and touched the map, lighting up the more isolated laboratories and the executive offices. “As it is, at least when Clint went missing, we were watching. Otherwise, Tony would've just vanished one day, and it's unlikely we would've been able to figure out why or how.”

Steve did his best to keep a calm face. It probably wasn't good that the thought alone was enough to send a shot of panic through him. He sucked in a careful breath, his hands digging into his thighs under the cover of the table. “Is it being controlled?”

“Unlikely,” Richards said. “The movements have been too erratic, its targets too random. It almost seems like some alien version of Tony's Roombas. Enough intelligence to go looking for what it's supposed to be collecting, but not enough to prioritize.”

“So nothing to worry about?” Natasha asked, her arms crossed over her chest.

“I wouldn't say that.” Richards tapped the tablet. “Jarvis, if you could, please, the globe?”

A projection of the earth popped up. “Because we caught it in the act of opening its portal, I was able to map the energy signature, and this is the interesting thing. There's dozens more that we've located using the Oracle network.” Red dots appeared across the surface of the globe. “And these may just be the ones that are active right now.”

“You are kidding me,” Fury said, his voice flat.

“Unfortunately, no.” Bruce gave the globe a spin. “Because these things don't take people, or even animals, just tech, it's gone unnoticed. There's no telling how long they've been here, or what they've taken.”

“Wonderful.” Steve shifted in his chair. “Can we reverse it? Make the portal it creates a stable, two-way thing?”

“We think so. We just need a little more time, a little more data,” Jane said. She'd become SHIELD's go-to girl on trans-dimensional portals. “What we'd suggest doing now, is to get it out of the vents so that we can try to get some better readings.

“How?” Coulson asked.

“Lure it out with tech. Watch how it reacts, what it's interested in, what it's not.”

“What do you have in mind?” Fury asked.

“We still have thirty Roombas, and it seems to really, really like the Roombas,” Bruce suggested.

“Good choice. Do it.” Fury stood. “You think we can start bringing people back in?”

“No reason to completely repopulate the building, but if we strip people of anything tech or metal. No one with any sort of medical devices. Pacemakers, replacement joints, even pins or metal plates.” Richards leaned his hands on the table. “Anything that could draw this thing's attention.”

“Makes sense. Let's get this moving, people. See if we can't get this thing down to one of the empty labs and get it scanned in some way that doesn't result in it stealing the scanners.” He glanced at Richards, at Bruce. “You can keep it under control?”

“We may be able to isolate it and find a way to deactivate it. But we don't want to take that chance until we've retrieved Clint and Tony,” Bruce explained. “Though finding the other portals give us a chance, if this one fails, to find another way to them. 

Steve took a deep breath. Relief was a rather mild word for that. As the team scrambled, Coulson already on the phone and Hill and Fury arguing over something in a low voice, Steve smiled at Bruce. “Good job,” he said, making Bruce smile back.

“Mostly Reed's work,” he said. “But I'm glad we were able to get as much as we were. I was...” He slid his fingers over the edge of the tablet, a nervous tic of a motion. “Quite concerned.”

Steve stood and patted him on the shoulder. “So was I. But we're going to get them back. Mostly thanks to what you've done.”

“It's not over yet. I'm going to go find myself a cart or two of Roombas and see if we can't get this thing moving,” Bruce said. “Reed, you have time to help us out with this?”

“Oh, this is fascinating,” Reed agreed. “I'd love to see the infamous Roombas. Tony has such a, well, let's say a charming childishness about his creations.”

Luckily he left before Steve could do something equally childish, like tripping the man. He let out a faint sigh. Okay, so he'd never admit it to Tony, but sometimes Steve had to agree with his accessment of Reed Richards; the man seemed to work at being annoying.

Steve's phone buzzed, and he pulled it out, frowning at the display. Unknown number. Curious, he took the call. “Hello, Steve Rogers.”

There was a beat of silence. “Hi, um, this is going to sound really weird, but my name is Stuart Murphy, and I live in Ames, Iowa. I was in the stairwell of my apartment building, and a foam dart, like, from a Nerf gun? It just fell out of nowhere. It had a note attached that said to call this number and tell Steve that Tony and Clint are safe, and they need another Roomba. And then it says, 'I'll get you a car if you do it.' Which is pretty funny. So I'm doing it. Even if there's no car.”

Steve slumped against the wall, sucking in a long, slow breath. “Oh, he'll get you a car. One moment, please.” He covered the phone with his palm. “We've got contact,” he said, and realized that all around the room, phones were ringing, people were talking, and grins were breaking out everywhere. Coulson glanced in his direction, and his eyes were filled with relief, and Steve grinned at him. Coulson smiled back, and amidst the chaos, the two of them shared a silent moment.

Steve wondered if these times would be worse, or better, if he ever did tell Tony he maybe might be in love with him. 

“Get the Roombas,” Fury yelled. “Let's get our boys back!”

*

Tony Stark's first words upon tumbling back to Earth were, “I'm going to have to buy so many fucking cars, aren't I?” 

Steve Roger's first words were, “So very many cars. You can start after we have a long discussion about using yourself as bait.”

Clint Barton's first words were, “I have negotiated the mineral and stolen tech rights to Bartonia to StarkIndustries in exchange for a lifetime supply of Swedish Fish, craft beer and the rights to drive any of Tony's cars whenever I want. I am a fucking boss at negotiation.”

Phil Coulson's first words were, “Are you wearing a crown?”

Fury ignored them all, because he was getting really good at pretending that the Avengers didn't exist when there wasn't an alien attack happening at that very moment. Something about his bleeding ulcer thriving on denial. With Richard and Stark working on it, they got the portal generator isolated and deactivated, and a SHIELD team was being put together to use the data that the eggheads had gathered to hunt down the rest of them.

It was Stark that went toe to toe with Fury, explaining in no uncertain terms that there was no way he was letting SHIELD back through the portals without a scientific expedition going along to deal with the tech that was there. Fury had kindly consented to send a SHIELD scientific team. Stark had laughed in his face. It hadn't helped that he was already carrying a sack of stuff that he flatly refused to let Fury anywhere near. 

Coulson didn't want to know what he was doing with what looked to him to be a microwave, a round glass and metal piece that resembled a school house clock with a sequence of interlocking plates beneath the crystal face, a pile of flexible metal sheets, a disco ball of a Rubik's cube and a robot hand. Some part of him was terrified that out of the landscape being described, THESE were the things that Tony Stark had handpicked to bring back.

Coulson had waited a good thirty seconds before he collared Clint and dragged him off towards medical. “I'm fine, sir,” Clint said, but he fell into step behind Coulson without any further argument.

“Not your call to make,” Coulson said, very careful to keep his hands to himself. It was proving to be very difficult. Hell, for that matter, it was hard to keep his hands from shaking.

“I understand, and I'm going to medical, you'll notice I am going to medical, but I want you to understand, I am fine, sir.”

Coulson's head snapped in his direction. “Are you humoring me, agent?”

“Perish the thought, sir. Trying to be reassuring.” Clint gave him a faint smile. “Just providing important intel in a timely manner so that you can be fully informed as to my current status. It's in the SHIELD rule book, I need to keep my handler updated at all times.”

“I'm not your handler any longer, Barton.”

“You'll always be my handler,” Clint said, and there was something so sweet about the way he said it, a statement that should've been mocking, or at the very least, a dry status statement, but it came out like a declaration of love, and wow, that was so very wrong.

And Coulson did not want to think about just how very turned on he was right now.

“You realize this is a very messed up relationship, don't you?” he asked, trying not to sound as out of breath as he was.

“Best one I've ever had,” Clint said, cheerful about it, and that was it, the last straw, and he made a startled sound as Coulson spun around, wrapped an arm around his chest, and shoved him through a half open door. He kicked is shut behind them, manhandling Clint back into the empty office.

“I need to tell you,” Coulson said, “that I did something really horrible and outed you to Captain America.”

Clint said, “Okay,” and snagged the front of Coulson's shirt in both hands, yanking him down for a hard, fast kiss.

Coulson ripped his mouth away before he could lose what was left of his brain cells. “I'm not kidding. I told Steve I was sleeping with you. I shouldn't have done that, I-”

“I've told you like fifty fucking times, I don't care, I've never made any secret of who I've slept with, and I don't care who knows, fuck me now and I'll go back there and tell all of them about it, Jesus, Phil, we have had this discussion and I don't care.” He jerked Coulson back down. “You know I don't care, or you never would've done it, and if you don't kiss me right now, I will do something drastic.”

“Well, as long as you're okay with it-” was as far as Coulson got before a growling Clint Barton twisted him around and knocked him back onto the couch. He dragged Clint down with him, and they landed hard, arms and legs tangling as their mouths met, hard and rough. Phil's hands were everywhere, smoothing over the planes of Clint's body, his fingers finding skin everywhere that they could.

“Is this-” Clint said, biting his way down Coulson's neck, nuzzling under his collar and licking the straining cords of his throat, “The sexiest medical check ever?”

“If I find blood, I'm going to be pissed, Clint.” Pissed, but not pissed enough to stop fumbling with Clint's pants, and Clint moaned against his shoulder, breath hot through Phil's shirt.

“You and me both, Phil.” Laughing, barely able to breathe, he made short work of Phil's shirt buttons, hands sliding over familiar skin and muscle and fingers digging in, too hard, too sharp, but he couldn't be bothered to care, and he'd feel bad about the bruising tomorrow, and the fact that this barely counted as sex, because neither one of them could stop kissing or talking or sucking in desperate breaths to do more than act like teenagers doing some heavy petting.

It as fast, and intense, and Clint screamed against Phil's shoulder when he came, and clung to Phil as his body jerked and spasmed through his own climax. Gasping for breath, Clint smoothed a hand over Phil's disordered hair. “Did we just have sex at SHIELD headquarters? Don't we have rules against that?”

“I'd tell you that was a handjob, and it barely counts, but you'd take that as an excuse to start pushing all sorts of boundaries,” Phil groaned against his temple. 

“Oh, I'm going to start pushing boundaries no matter what.” Clint grinned. “Not dead. You told Steve we're fuckbuddies. Just had sex in an empty office at SHIELD. It's a brand new fucking day, sir.”

Phil groaned. “I'd regret this if your hand wasn't still down my pants.”

“Yeah, why do you think I haven't moved it yet?”

*

Clint barely made it through the door, eyes blurry, body aching. He should probably have just stayed in bed, or, better yet, gone to stand in a hot shower for a couple of hours, but he wanted food. He wanted food and he needed coffee. He needed it like breathing.

“Morning,” Tony said, huddled around his coffee cup. He looked like death warmed over, refrozen, defrosted, and then thrown in a plastic bowl.

It had been a long week of scientific excavation of alien trash dumps. Clint wondered if Tony had slept in the last few days. It didn't seem like he had, but the majority of the Roombas were back at the tower, meaning things were winding down. Not that Clint didn't enjoy playing sentry to a bunch of crazy ass scientists lead by the eternally bickering pair of Stark and Richards, but yes, as a matter of fact, the didn't enjoy that at all.

“I swear to God, Stark, if there is not coffee in that pot, I will shoot out the tires of every car you have.”

“Cranky this morning, aren't we, and when is there ever not coffee in my coffee pot?”

Clint chuckled. “When you're chewing on a bag of grounds while waiting for a fresh pot to brew.” He stepped carefully through the kitchen, avoiding the mass of Roombas that were chittering and chirping at each other and chasing down non-existant dirt. Tony, with a self-satisfied smile, flipped off the chore chart.

Coulson entered the kitchen, eyebrows arched as he stared down. The Roombas whirled and bumped into each other and for the most part, stayed on the floor, making walking very difficult. Tony put his thumb and index finger in his mouth and blew an ear-splitting whistle. “Look, Roombas, it's Clint!”

As one, the Roombas chorused, “You have saved our lives! We are eternally grateful!”

“Holy shit,” Clint said, starting to laugh.

Tony leaned back against the counter. “Oh, did I mention, I gave them speakers? Because of reasons.” He saluted with his coffee cup, a wicked grin on his face. Calcifer the toaster popped next to him, and he leaned over to snag a horrifically colored PopTart. “Good job, thank you.”

“Oh, hell no,” Phil said, his voice flat. “No. Absolutely not.”

“I love you, Stark. I fucking love you and all of your fabulous, fabulous crazy, you are a madman, and I love it,” Clint said, laughing so hard that he could barely get the words out. Gripping the counter to keep himself upright, he looked at Phil, who was staring at the Roombas as if he wanted to light them on fire with his mind. “Let's adopt them!”

The look of flaming death was shifted in Clint's direction, and Clint fluttered his eyelashes. “No,” Coulson said, and took the coffee pot. For a moment, it looked like he wasn't going to bother with a mug, was just going to throw back a slug of it straight from the pot. Only the smirk on Stark's face seemed to dissuade him, and he reached for a cup as the Roombas hovered around, bumping into his legs and searching the counter for stray crumbs. “I will not live with these things sneaking into my room and screaming 'Toy Story' quotes at me at all hours of the day and night.”

“Don't be ridiculous, Coulson, they only scream 'Toy Story' quotes at Clint.” Tony gave him a wide, brilliant smile. “You get 'Men in Black' quotes.” He took a sip of his coffee. “And before you ask, I did make them taser proof with the last upgrades.”

“How about bullet proof?”

“Not quite as necessary. C'mon, Coulson, he loves them so,” Tony said, as Clint, still laughing like a loon, taunted the Roomba mob with an open sugar packet. 

“He's demented.” Coulson rubbed his forehead, a faint smile on his mouth. “Fine, Stark. Fine. I won't shoot at them. For now. Until you lose control again.”

“There is no reason to suspect that I'll lose control of them,” Tony said, yawning. “I fixed some of their programming, so stop being such a pain in my ass.”

“There's too many-”

Tony held up a hand. “There are eighty-seven of them. Thirty are being dispatched to SHIELD headquarters to patrol the ventilation system, and keep an eye on other places that people have trouble going. That's a large enough group to serve as a hive mind, they won't get lonely and they'll be able to patrol efficiently. Another twenty-five will serve the same purpose here at Stark Tower. Natasha's requested a few to use as sparring and target practice in the gym, and a few for the range as well. Upgraded armor and repulsors and they should make them useful as targets and attackers; twelve should work for the two locations combined. Ten will stay in my workshop, because anything that involves less cleaning on Dummy's part is to my benefit. Those will also be the core control group for if any of the others need repair or upgrade, they get along well with the fabrication units. Four will go to Bruce's lab, and yes, I'll make sure they don't annoy him. Two for Steve, because he is a softy and he secretly likes them and they're the only thing that can get eraser debris and charcoal out of my antique oriental carpets.”

He smirked at Coulson. “That leaves, um, if my calculations are correct, and they always, are, that leaves four to run around the Avengers' quarters. Which I'm pretty sure you can live with.”

“I hate you, Stark,” Coulson said. “He's only going to use them for morally and ethically questionable acts.”

“FUCK, yes,” Clint agreed, cheerful about it. “I need one of those horrible suction cup dart guns, this is going to be so awesome.”

“He's a SHIELD agent and an Avenger, that goes without saying,” Tony said. “What do you think Fury and I will be using them for? Straight, unadulterated evil.”

“No evil, Tony, I don't want to see SHIELD's plan,” Steve said, wandering into the kitchen wearing a pair of jogging pants and t-shirt, and looking entirely too chipper for the early hour. “Morning, Clint, morning, Phil, morning, Calcifer, morning, Roombas.”

“Steeeeeeeeeeeeeeve,” the Roombas chorused and Steve made an undignified squeaking noise, backpedaling like he was in fear of his life. They followed.

“You know, I almost turned down this job,” Clint said to Coulson, still laughing.

“Imagine my shock. I cannot imagine why you almost turned down this posting,” Coulson said, sipping his coffee as Steve gave up on dignity and tried to hide behind a laughing Tony. This did not dissuade the Roombas in the least. It might've encouraged them. “I mean, look at this. The chance of a lifetime.”

“Very few people can state that they've seen Captain America fend off an overly affectionate Roomba mob with its own inventor, that's true,” Clint said, one eyebrow arched. He leaned into Phil's shoulder, just a little, knowing he was pushing his luck and not caring. Maybe he could get away with it. He'd try until he was slapped down, that was just how he lived his life.

Phil slung an arm around Clint's waist, and leaned in, brushing a kiss against the marksman's jaw, and Clint's brain just shut down. With huge eyes, he glanced towards Coulson, who was now smiling, a little half-smile as he sipped his coffee and watched Tony try to convince Steve that the Roombas were not actually going to consume his brains or follow him into the bathroom.

Clint took the mug out of Coulson's hand, set it on the counter, and snagged the other man by the front of his t-shirt. Coulson arched his eyebrows, but his smile only got wider as he allowed Clint to drag him from the kitchen. Natasha, yawning, got out of their way. She gave Clint a speaking glance, and, out of sight to everyone but Phil, patted him lightly on the ass.

“Watch it,”Coulson told her.

She gave him an innocent look. “Girl talk, Coulson. Any. Time. You. Want.”

“Don't you dare,” Clint yelled over his shoulder at her. “You tell the most horrible lies.”

“If you're lucky, they'll be lies,” she called back, and there was laughter in his voice. “If you're unlucky, I'll tell them about Antwerp.”

“Antwerp?” Coulson asked Clint, allowing himself to be dragged along.

“Don't worry, sir, the statute of limitations is almost up, and anyway, they don't have the right name on the warrant. They don't even have the right alias on the warrant. And Natasha's making it all up, anyway.”

“Why do I love you, again?”

“Trashy, trashy taste in men, sir.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short coda: not so short. Thank you for your patience and kindness, I hope this was worth the time it took to read it. I was desperate to finish it before seeing the movie and made it by... Twenty five and a half hours. Lord help me. I hope everyone enjoyed the continuing adventures of Clint and his Roombas, and the SHIELD agent who tolerates them.
> 
> Thank you for your support.

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